'Brokeback Mountain' at 15

[quote] It should have also become a Best Picture winner, but lost to the since-largely forgotten Crash in one of Oscar’s all-time biggest head-scratchers.

I am SO glad the author of the article went there.

Because it's absolutely true.

It's a remarkable movie in a lot of ways, but it's arguable whether BBM made any lasting impact on movies at all. It's not like we've seen a plethora of major gay male romances on the big screen, certainly not from the big studios. And not really on the small screen, either.

PS: fuck CRASH, and all the members of the Academy who supported it.

It opened the closet door for legions of Millennial brahs. But they're still looking for their straight-acting cowboy..

Crash was a piece of shite. Possibly the worst movie ever made about LA -- and there have been a lot!

I adored BBM. Read the novella as well, which is fantastic. I thought those two boys did a great job in it as well.

I can honestly say I’ve still never seen this movie. Since it’s supposed to be depressing, I didn’t see a need to watch it.

I think I will watch this again soon, and see if it holds up fifteen years later. I only saw it once but I do remember thinking that it should have definitely won best picture that year.

It is no longer acceptable because of the scene in the tent where Jake Gyllenhaal's character was raped by Heath Ledger.

R4 - totally shitty filmmaking on a story that had good bones.

We still hadn’t gotten out of the “all gay stories must end tragic” phase of filmmaking at this point.

I thought it was ok. Nothing special.

I really feel like the score is what made the movie so special. Yes, it was heartbreaking and all of that, but it was the cinematography and mostly the music that really made it resonate with me. To this day, I feel it was the fake sideburns that lost BBM the Oscar.

Ledger's performance was amazing as well.

The hairpieces and wigs (AnnE I'm looking at you) were problematic.

For a while after the Oscars we had a [italic]Crash[/italic] troll who would post constantly about how wonderful that movie was.

[quote] the tent where Jake Gyllenhaal's character was raped by Heath Ledge

Would it be considered rape today? I mean Enis somewhat forces the initiation, but Jack doesn’t see it as rape.

[quote]It is no longer acceptable because of the scene in the tent where Jake Gyllenhaal's character was raped by Heath Ledger.

One man's "rape" is another man's "surprise anal."

It was basically Romeo and Juliet, with some of the most beautiful cinematography ever seen. Everyone can relate, because everyone's loved someone they can't have.

I’ve actually never seen it? Isn’t that bizarre?

Agree R12 - the cinematography and music made the movie. Decent script - and Heath, Michelle and Anne were very good. But the images and music are what will make me watch it again.

I can’t believe it’s been 15 years. I remember thinking that it was the end of the road - that I could have never imagined a gay love story as a blockbuster as a kid in the 80s and I was glad to have been alive to see it. To now have gay marriage was beyond my wildest dreams. I feel very lucky to have been alive for these 50 years in history.

It was a bore. Hathaway was atrocious and Ledger mumbled like his teeth were falling out.

'Jack Twist? Jack Nasty!' is still the most unintentionally comedic movie quote this century.

OP, pun intended?

[quote]Brokeback’s legacy still mounts today

[quote] the tent where Jake Gyllenhaal's character was raped by Heath Ledger

This is the most ridiculous fucking thing I have ever read about Brokeback Mountain.

Jack Twist raped??? No. Jack Twist wanted Ennis' cock in him. BADLY.

Straight people will never understand gay sex or gay relationships.

They don't understand cruising culture, and they don't understand the intense feelings between two MEN. Not women, not a man and a woman. Two MEN.

We are driven by basic sexual instinct. Women are driven by emotion.

We want sex now, we want sex fast, and we just want to get off.

If anything, Jack Twist instigated the encounter. Ennis didn't even know what the fuck he was doing. He was just horny. Jack knew exactly what he was doing, and he WANTED it.

To suggest that he was "raped," is not only some WOKE/SJW bullshit, but it's also completely incorrect.

You assholes need to get the fuck out of here with that shit.

Ennis and Jack's first encounter was a goddamned hookup. Nothing more. Nothing less.

Cancel Brokeback Mountain, bro @R24!

No, R25.

The movie doesn't have to be cancelled.

BBM was excellent.

R8 needs to be fucking cancelled.

Stupid cunt.

[quote] To suggest that he was "raped," is not only some WOKE/SJW bullshit, but it's also completely incorrect.

That was my point, R24. But nuance is difficult to convey on Datalounge.

[quote] nuance is difficult to convey on Datalounge

Not for someone who actually knows how to communicate in English.

They were not “cowboys”. They were sheepherders.

R14 - I think we were supposed to kind of notice that she had the big and fake hair of a typical suburban wealthy Texan woman. In the last scene over the phone her acting was good. She knows she is lying and she also knows what her husband was up to and who is on the other line and why but she carries it as well as her overly made-up face and overly styled hair.

BBM was an artistic movie.

Those of you who were expecting a porno movie with non-stop gay fucking, would clearly be disappointed.

But for those of us who were paying attention to the actual story, it was moving, emotional, and sophisticated.

It was a true love story, with all of the accompanying drama that ANY love story would bring along with it.

Don't tell me what I was expecting, R31.

Little Miss R32 has stated her boundaries!

I've never seen it. Is there any nudity?

I am glad Edward Norton was not in the film. I would have a lot of trouble picturing him as an outdoorsy/cowboy/camping/fishing kind of guy. I think he's a great actor but he would not fit in this one.

Did crash win because it had such a large cast with so many friends that it could tip the scales on those second or third-round votes? I really like how the AA vote on the big categories which is the only reason that I can fathom Crash winning. Too many Academy members placed it as their 2nd or 3rd choice because they knew someone in the film getting just enough votes to win. I'm sure some homophobia made a few voters refuse to even watch BBM.

I will admit that I felt something from Crash during at least two scenes that made me nearly cry (I was in high school so sue me). Crash did leave an impact as did BBM but I was renting that just for the sex or kissing scenes to jerk off to. A few years later I really watched the movie and could respect the work.

Here is how the academy votes. Ignore the first 15 seconds commercial.

There were those in Hollywood and in the press at the time--Roger Ebert, for one--who actively advocated against BBM in favor of CRASH, simply because racism was "the more significant social issue."

Hollywood seemed to think it was dutifully addressing decades of institutionalized racism and righting wrongs by recognizing CRASH. almost a decade after Rodney King was beaten by the LAPD and the riots ensued in their city. Additionally, there were other, older members of the Academy, like Tony Curtis, who actively refused to watch their screeners of BBM and voted against it.

Remember this when the right wing starts crowing about how progressive and "left" all of Hollywood was/is.

Boo hoo! Weep, weep! Let's always be portrayed as victims.

And that guitar music was awful.

Fuck off, R38.

For some reason I just thought of this deleted scene from Knocked Up - Jonah Hill watching Brokeback Mountain on TV and ranting to Katherine Heigl about the lack of explicit gay sex. Years later it remains true: why the hell do I need to see Anne Hathaway’s tits in THIS movie?

Wasn't to my taste. Dull and depressing.

Great movie with great actor. Heath Ledger is great in the movie, so is Michelle Williams too.

[quote] There were those in Hollywood and in the press at the time--Roger Ebert, for one--who actively advocated against BBM in favor of CRASH, simply because racism was "the more significant social issue."

Plus, his wife is African American.

Same Time Next Year with sodomy

When the movie shows that Heath kept Jake’s shirt his entire life, I can’t stop crying.

I wish there was was an extended version of the film which includes the clip from the trailer with Jake shirtless in jeans and a cowboy hat, standing on a log. He looks so hot!

Jake was great in that film he deserves more credit. He’s good at playing an eager gay man.

R42 The correct name is (white) Michelle Williams.

I was actually really angry when Crash won the Best Picture. It was obviously homophobic decision from the Academic members. BBM is and will always be a gay classic. It’s so beautiful and heartbreaking. I’m so so grateful that Ang Lee was the chosen director, straight man who portrayed a gay love story on film better than any gay men could have ever accomplished

[quote] Jake was great in that film he deserves more credit.

To get the credit he deserves, he took a journey 'cross the Pond.

You weren't the only one to be angry, R48. IIRC, DataLounge was on fire for 72 hours after BBM lost best picture. Hell hath no fury like a gay themed movie being snubbed by the Oscars. I'm surprised the whole site didn't crash (pardon the pun).

I've been on this board since early 00s, and I haven't seen such outrage and indignity displayed here since then.

It's a simple fact that before the BBM snub, I watched The Oscars every year, always attending big Oscar parties, it was a huge thing.

After that year, I have never watched another Oscars broadcast again. Never attended another party. That continues to this day.

Same here, R51. It just killed it for me in 2006.

From seeing Gwyneth obviously get the Oscar when in fact Cate Blanchett deserved it for Elizabeth to BBM's snub...I have known the Oscars are just PC and cowardly wannabe SJWs who reward their little clique of favorites. I never watch.

For anyone wanting to see another movie about doomed gay lovers "The Consequence", a 1977 German film directed by Wolfgang Petersen, is worth seeing. It's based on an autobiographical novel by the Swiss author Alexander Ziegler. It's about an actor named Martin (played by Jurgen Prochnow) who goes to prison for having sex with a minor (a willing 15 year old). The prison warden's son, a teenager named Thomas (played by a very pretty Ernst Hannawald) develops a fixation on Martin and manages to sneak into his cell and spend the night there. They fall madly in love; after Martin gets out of prison they try to be together but are thwarted at every turn. Poor young Thomas gets the brunt of the abuse; rejected by his parents for being gay, he's sent to reform school, where he is tormented by the fellow delinquents and a sadistic warden. It's really a well done film and Prochnow and Hannawald are very good in it. It contains no explicit sex but it does have one of the most passionate kissing scenes I've ever seen in a movie.

R54 Good call. And oddly, another movie (Polish?) called Consequences was about a gay young man in corrections.

Annie Proulx's short story was harrowing story about loneliness and yearning and life not working out the way you'd choose. It was about the human heart. It happened to also be about two men in love. The movie followed that for the most part. It wasn't about "all gay stories must end in death" etc. I mean, Romeo and Juliet, eh? Those stars that cross know no gender nor orientation.

R12 yes, the stunning imagery and haunting music is something of a crutch.

It would be interesting to see an edit of the movie with all the landscape scenes removed, and the score replaced either with silence or something less lovely. Then we’d know if the story and characterisation on film actually holds up on its own.

[quote] The film, about the secret and ultimately tragic love story between two men (Jake Gyllenhaal and the late Heath Ledger) who meet as farmhands in the rural and rugged terrain of eastern Wyoming

[quote] shooting the $14 million indie in a very cold Alberta, Canada.

Why wasn't it filmed in Wyoming? Is Wyoming more expensive than Alberta?

Probably tax credits.

The depicted mountain countryside is so obviously Canada in my eyes. The landscapes simply don’t look American.

Sometimes, I half expect Wolverine to come stalking out of the woods and hills to rip Ennis & Jack’s sheep to shreds.

R40 that’s fantastic. Normally I dislike Jonah Hill, but his character in that scene is very funny, and also makes a strong point. The baseball/homerun analogy is gold.

According to comments, this scene was an ad-libbed take, in which Hill was attempting to get Heigl to break character and corpse.

No matter how may times I watch this movie, the ending always leaves me in an emotional state. Daughter leaves, and he opens the closet door ..the clothes and the postcard. I'm a teary wreck.

Brokeback Mountain is half dead to me!

The thing I recall was DL's collective Mary! meltdown when Oscar was so cruel to it. It illustrated to me how desperate we are for approval, still. I get that and am empathetic. But the sound and fury, in retrospect, was DL's version of Britain the week after Diana died.

And then I pledged Tri Delt at SMU.

Was you Tri Delt? I was Kappa Phi myself.

I'm a member of the Academy and there has never been such a strong marketing campaign as that for Crash. It was even greater than Harvey Weinstein's campaign for Shakespeare in Love. Old-fashioned Hollywood "liberals" did everything they could to make Crash win, and there was a very personal campaign on its behalf from Whoopi Goldberg. Despite this, I certainly voted for Brokeback and genuinely thought it was going to win. About a week before the awards ceremony, I had dinner with Gore Vidal and several other writers (at Musso & Frank!). Most of those present agreed with me that Brokeback would win, but Gore shot that down. He mentioned both the strong Crash lobbying and "all those members who are technicians and live in Sherman Oaks" who'd never vote for a pro-gay film. Sadly, he was right.

Granted I didn't read all the posts so I don't know if this was addressed. The short story by Annie Proulx was beautiful and subtle. It took years to get it on film and while the movie was impressive, I still appreciate the story more than the movie.

It's important to note that within the film business, the Producers' Guild of America award for best picture is far more important. Brokeback Mountain won the award. Equally, the Directors' Guild of America is a more important directing award. Ang Lee, the director of Brokeback, won the award for the film.

[quote] "all those members who are technicians and live in Sherman Oaks" who'd never vote for a pro-gay film. Sadly, he was right.

R65, things have changed for the better between Brokeback's loss and Moonlight's (another gay film competing another bad, unrealistic movie about LA) win?

[quote]Possibly the worst movie ever made about LA -- and there have been a lot!

The winner is La La Land!

Not one single gay person was involved in the making of BBM. That wouldn't happen today.

"Old-fashioned Hollywood "liberals" did everything they could to make Crash win, and there was a very personal campaign on its behalf from Whoopi Goldberg. "

So Whoopi Goldberg waged "a very personal campaign" to make Crash win? Yet another reason to hate her.

R24 Bottom Line - A Stiff Dick Has No Conscience.

15 years later and Jake is still in the closet.

I personally think Jake is a closet gay with no solid evidences. I can’t say the same for Health tho. I don’t think he’s gay or even bi.