Brokeback Mountain (Ang Lee, 2005)

[David Ehrenstein]

"cowered in fear"? You're hallucinating.

[HerrSchreck]

"cowered in fear"? You're hallucinating.

Not the first nor the last false vision. Like the time I thought you might have got your writing assignments owing to a quick mind & writing skills.

By the way I'm outa here until midnite. My logon period has ended for the day.

Don't you get hopeful Ehren. You're still my helpless little bitch. I'll be back tonight to shatter your head into 18 worthless ounces of bus station pay toilet refuse.

[David Ehrenstein]

How vivid.

[Michael]

Any comments on The Adventures of Felix would be very much appreciated.

I want to buy the Lifshitz films on DVD. Come Undone: the UK DVD is 97 min and the US DVD is 94 min. Why the difference? Is there any difference between those DVDs qualitywise?

[Grimfarrow]

This thread has derailed worse than a Jennifer Aniston vehicle. Can we stop the sniping and do something worthwhile? How about we make recommendations of films others should watch? Here are my recommendations for good gay films of 2005 (yes, it's a list, but it's better than the mean-spirited squabblings, eh?).

I'll be the first offender (in no order):

The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros
Loggerheads
A Year Without Love
Hilde's Journey
Odete
Tokyo Magic Hour
Whole New Thing
Dorian Blues
That Man: Peter Berlin

WILD SIDE, MYSTERIOUS SKIN, TROPICAL MALADY, etc. were 2004 films that I programmed last year, so they don't count.

And do note the lack of TRANSAMERICA and BREAKFAST ON PLUTO - they suck.

[Michael]

Grazie, Grimfarrow. Exactly what I need. I will make a note of all your recommendations.

[Grimfarrow]

Some caveats about these films' release in the US.

On DVD:
Dorian Blues

In select theatres:
Loggerheads
That Man: Peter Berlin

To be released in theatres (date TBA):
Odete
Whole New Thing

In competition at Sundance:
The Blossoming of Maximo Oliveros

No idea about the rest.

[David Ehrenstein]

And do note the lack of TRANSAMERICA and BREAKFAST ON PLUTO - they suck.

DO NOT!!

[Grimfarrow]

"May be Jordan's wildest mis-shot yet, so dense with dying fizzle and limp ideas that I began to wonder if Jordan has an evil twin, or if there are in fact several Neil Jordans, among them at least one literate stylist and one humor-handicapped village idiot. "
- Michael Atkinson, Village Voice

Sums it up pretty much for me.

[David Ehrenstein]

Breakfast on Pluto is more than an improvement on The Crying Game -- it's a recantation of it.

Cillian Murphy is superb. Don't miss it.

[marty]

The Crying Game has dated pretty badly. I saw it recently and I can't see what all the hype and fuss was about.

[exte]

I couldn't disagree more. I think it's a fantastic, exceptionally well made film. The performances all around are marvelous. And I was never made to feel like it was so 1992... Plus, the poster was just perfect, and a crying shame it is that they didn't use it for the SE dvd release...

BTW, wasn't Matt Damon widely considered brave for following up Good Will Hunting and Saving Private Ryan with The Talented Mr. Ripley?

[Grimfarrow]

Breakfast on Pluto is more than an improvement on The Crying Game -- it's a recantation of it.

Cillian Murphy is superb. Don't miss it.

Cilian Murphy's "performance" as Kitten is as retarded, prissy, outdated, delusionally self-absorbed as a village idiot. I was wishing that he was the one who died from that bombing in the film, considering that, comparatively, his friend is much less mentally challenged. I find it disturbing that you'd spend so much vitriol on BROKEBACK yet praise a film that is much more homophobic than that gay western.

[HerrSchreck]

I want to support, with some personal modification and very inadquately my friend Schrecko's points about context and the uniqueness of great art. I can't rewatch Birth of a Nation to this day. And I frankly find Triumph of the Will a dead end and an unmoving void.

And just want to second that notion. I think (and I'll be brief, know it's off thread but still relevant somewhat owing to the discomfort for portrayal of a minority group) that BIRTH is the least watchable of Griffiths "important" films. Aside from it's innovations (I think overstated, btw, what with the work the Italians, Feulliade, Yevgeni Bauer, as well as Americans like Walsh, & George Loane Tucker, were doing at the same time & even earlier than BIRTH), its racism & mindnumbing brainlessness (made even more funny by it's sanctimonious pose about godliness & promoting the cause of peace) are a hilarious/terrifying illustration of how bigotry can cause a fantastically talented & obviously innovative mind to spout the kind of absurdity usually heard in the lobotomy ward.

I'm far more impressed by INTOLERANCE (his true world-changing masterpiece still reverbing in the "art-house", whereas BIRTH's innovations reverb in the taut, hi-energy editing & pacing of the typical action 'blockbuster), BROKEN BLOSSOMS, SORROWS OF SATAN (I have a print including the casting out of Satan from the cadre of angels & the gates of heaven), ISN'T LIFE WONDERFUL, WAY DOWN EAST (the pursuit of Gish by Barthelmess thru the snowstorm is the actual seed for Soviet Avant Garde's multiple-take/same-action insertion editing... if Griffith was young Eisenstein's god, then this is the voice he heard while on the way to the Damascus gate.)

[David Ehrenstein]

Well maybe we'll se with Minghella's next which stars Vera Farmiga.

The only form of intolerance absent from Intolerance is racism.

Cilian Murphy's "performance" as Kitten is as retarded, prissy, outdated, delusionally self-absorbed as a village idiot. I was wishing that he was the one who died from that bombing in the film, considering that, comparatively, his friend is much less mentally challenged. I find it disturbing that you'd spend so much vitriol on BROKEBACK yet praise a film that is much more homophobic than that gay western.

Don't hold back, grim -- tell us what you really think.

[David Ehrenstein]

Tears are meaningless.

There isn't a discussion of Brokeback Mountain that doesn't include several "I cried"(s) and "The audience was in tears," or "My boyfriend sobbed uncontrollably."

SO

FUCKING

WHAT !!!!!!!

It's a movie.

And Das Leid von der Erde is just a song.

[che-etienne]

I'm sorry but when something has an emotional impact on someone let alone a whole audience, which I think these days is actually quite rare, then it shouldn't just be dismissed. As much as I hate "Titanic" and lots of other Hollywood melodramatic schlock of the past few years, to me there is a fine line between movies like "Titanic" and "Brokeback Mountain". As long as one understands where one's tears and emotions are coming from then I think it is a good thing to be emotionally affected by a film. I cried during "Fahrenheit 9/11" but understood afterwards and perhaps even while crying that I was being manipulated into doing so, but at the same time there was something genuinely sad about that woman's story and her despair. I almost cried during "Brokeback Mountain" at the end because it was quite moving, and the final shot has profound meaning to me. I cried when I saw "Oliver Twist" because the ending was heartbreaking and transcendent. Tears are not just tears, especially when these days so little moves me to let them out.

[Kirkinson]

And Das Leid von der Erde is just a song.

Technically it's a symphony.

[ben d banana]

... the work is crap (like all fascist art.)

Oh David H, you know where that logic leads.

David E, what means anything? Screeching into the void at your keyboard? TOP MARKS!!!

[David Ehrenstein]

As long as one understands where one's tears and emotions are coming from then I think it is a good thing to be emotionally affected by a film.

But there hasn't been any such understanding. Among many of the film's acolytes to debate its worth is off the table. It's value is treated as a self-evident truth. And "I cried" is regarded as the ultimate statement to be made about it.

[exte]

Tears do count for something, just like page counts do. This thread has now hit 20 pages and counting. I'm sure that says a lot about the film, despite all the disclaimers and naysayers. Look at my Clerks II thread. Only one post. Okay, it's not out yet, but it still says a lot. And despite what the Davids on this thread have to say, especially the professional critic, they only feed fuel to the fire, and make people want to go see it for themselves anyway... That's what I don't get. If you really wanted the film to fail, you wouldn't mention it or draw attention to it. Sure there have been some valid points made here and there, but 20 pages? What's all the fuss about? I'll probably see it this week to find out...

[David Ehrenstein]

If you really wanted the film to fail, you wouldn't mention it or draw attention to it.

You have a completely reductive view of criticism. A negative review doesn't infer that the critic is standing in the theater doorway to block other people from entering.

[Michael]

A straight woman wrote the short story Brokeback Mountain.

Two straight screenwriters adapted Brokeback Mountain.

A straight man directed Brokeback Mountain.

Two straight actors played the main gay roles.

Apparently no gay presence.. and Brokeback Mountain is a gay story. Doesn't make sense to me.

Is it wrong if a gay person like myself to find that unacceptable? Is it reductive to think that way? I don't know. I still and will always have a lot to learn. Even though Happy Together, a great gay film, was directed by a straight director Wong Kar-Wai, one of the gay lovers was played by the late Leslie Cheung. I often wonder how much Leslie contributed to this film due to the fact he was gay.

[marty]

A straight woman wrote the short story Brokeback Mountain.

Two straight screenwriters adapted Brokeback Mountain.

A straight man directed Brokeback Mountain.

Two straight actors played the main gay roles.

Apparently no gay presence.. and Brokeback Mountain is a gay story. Doesn't make sense to me.

So I guess then you would have a problem with all the straight films directed by gay directors.

[Michael]

You're not looking at the whole picture, marty.