Brokeback Mountain

I went to see this tonight and left heart-broken. So heart-broken, in fact, that I could not cry. I just left feeling this oppressive weight in my chest, on the cusp of spilling out into something wild and uncontrollable. Heath Ledger is astonishing. My friend Kelly and I went back to her place to watch the Golden Globe's and were unreservedly rooting for Heath Ledger. The range of his character, the utter change in his physical presence from other movies we've seen him in before.... Monster's Ball gave a tiny, bitter taste of what he had available and ready to tap into. I could go on for days about the movie, but will limit it to a few, paltry comments.

In one scene, Ennis' (Heath Ledger) divorce has been finalized and Jack (Jake Gyllenhal) drives 14 hours to his house with the hope that the divorce signals Ennis' decision to live a life with Jack. Ennis tells him he's awful sorry he thought that and tells him to leave. Jack then drives to Juarez where he finds a hustler and slinks off to a dark, black alley. Though some reviews have said that this marks the difference between Ennis and Jack's limits/span of desire, I think it very simply communicated the feeling we all have when we are so brutally rejected: you want the taste of someone else's body--and you don't want it to be anyone who means anything, you just hope your pain will be swallowed up by the flat, unprofitable fulfillment of desire that makes the rejection, loss, and lack of the one you love more palatable. It is both a way to "cleanse" your palate (you don't want the last hands that have touched you to be theirs, the last pleasure you've received to be theirs) and a viscious revenge.

I was floored by Heath Ledger's performance. If for nothing else, it is worth it to see a spectrum of queerness: Ennis desires women but is in love with Jack. In fact, the sex scenes with his wife are just about as hot as those with Jack. But, there's intense and profound love in the latter, which endears you to his relationship with the former. There's a great scene where Ennis has taken his wife and two little girls to a 4th of July celebration and two biker bro's are sitting behind them, talking about who they want to fuck and where the best pussy can be found. Ennis tells them to keep it down around his girls; they refuse. Ennis gets up and beats the shit out of one and threatens the other into submission. I (somewhat jokingly) told Kelly that Ennis' character was the type of man I want: is not or has not been afraid to have sex with men and will still kick the shit out of anyone who messes with his woman! Ha ha. She told me I was crazy. Yeah, well.

If ya'll have seen it: what did you think???