hehe --- but it IS a gay cowboy lovestory :nowords:

This evening, it occured to me that watching this film reminded me of when I saw the movie Maurice. However, I am at such a completely different stage of my life compared to when I saw the first movie.

I saw Maurice my freshman year in college.... of course I saw it in the movie theater by myself. I walked out of the old Varsity theater, and strolled down the Drag knowing then and there that I would not hide my homosexuality, but be honest with myself and others.

I think Brokeback Mountain is a clear lens into the way life was back then, and how it doesn't have to be today.

The prominent theme of the movie is nature. The guys are brought together by nature, on a remote mountain. Even the name of the mountain is important to the meaning of the film. In other words.... the film portrays homosexuality as a natural act, and not a decadent choice.

Watching the main characters lie to their wives and each other, as an effect of them strugging with their own relationship is painful to watch. If you or I had been born thirty years earlier, would we have gone through the same thing?

Perhaps such depictions are almost alien to a gay audience today where gay TV characters are on network TV.

Frankly, I cannot see Brokeback Mountain as anti-gay at all. And hopefully more people will see that westerns are often a wonderful vehicle to explore human emotions. (The Last Picture Show, Hud, Lonesome Dove)

Quote Originally Posted by XXXWriterDude
To me, this shows how deeply the gay community has sunk into a pattern of victimization in which we over-analyze everything and are always looking for ways in which we are being attacked and/or degraded. Brokeback is simply a gorgeously realized, emotionally devastating depiction of love between two men who had no concept of a "gay identity" or Stonewall or the AIDS epidemic or ACT-Up or gay pride parades.
Possibly. I see the modern gay rights movement as completely self-centered and self-absorbed. Listen to how people talk about gay rights, and usually you will hear people talking about themselves. They want the right to marry. They want this, they want that. Me and my boyfriend want. Me.

I think compared to the lives of gays like us one generation ago, as depicted in Brokeback Mountain, there is room to appreciate what we have, not just want we want. To top it all off, Brokeback Mountain was created by straight people....some straight people who thankfully are not so self-absorbed in their own problems that they can paint some vividly true depictions of other people's lives.

Steve