Sunday, February 12, 2006

Brokeback Moment

I don't see many movies on the big screen but Brokeback Mountain dug it's claws into my sensibilities and won't let go. I don't pay much heed to professional movie critics as art is pure subjectivity and a critic is merely providing their opinion from their own context and prejudices and happen to get paid for it. My simple gage of a movie is how quickly the two hours passes, whether I merge with the characters, and to the degree that the movie haunts me afterwards. Well, score 10 on all 3 accounts. I didn't want it to end. I felt a deep connection with all three of the main characters and I can't stop thinking about it.

BTW. My sexual orientation runs as straight as a Kansas highway.

This is not a gay cowboy flick. Think Love Story between 2 people who happen to be Wyoming cowboys and not Boston preppies. Think Romeo and Juliet in a 1960's western setting riding horses, herding sheep and speaking in western drawl rather than Shakespearean English. This is a movie of human passion. It's a depiction of a raw deep connection between two humans in an environment of social and emotional conflicts and taboos. This movie hurts and fulfills on so many levels. One feels depressed at the ending but soon realizes that the characters experienced something to be cherished forever. I doubt many will ever be so fortunate to feel something as strong as this in their lives but I would argue that one hasn't truly lived unless they do.

To shun or be afraid of this story line is a lost opportunity of witnessing one of life's true passions play out in the cinematic art form.

1 comment:

Geo said...

FRIENDS WITH MONEY, believe it or not, is a film I wish would have gone on longer. My wife and I both agreed on this. Very good character study. I am always let down by anything for which the solution is a shooting, except when, in Dr. Strangelove Chill Wills(?) rides the atomic bomb down like a wild cowboy (speaking of cowboys). Yes, we enjoyed Brokeback too.