Last night, after happy hour at Daily Grill with some of my co-workers, Thom and I went to see Brokeback Mountain. Going in, I was guarding against overinflated expectations, and my familiarity with the short story did make the opening exposition seem a little slow, but still one word that comes to mind after seeing it is “haunting.” This is a movie that doesn’t grab you; it unfolds slowly, drawing you in until you are invested in all of the characters’ emotions. I got a little teary during Jack’s “I wish I knew how to quit you” speech, and at other scenes of longing and desperation, of which there are many.
The story begins in the summer of 1963 and spans several years, and the movie even seems to hark back to a dying breed of filmmaking (at least among big-name movies): the controlled, forceful composition and editing, the spareness of the storytelling, the subtle but deliberate acting, etc. I’d love to see it again sometime, but like I said, it’s so haunting; it’s still with me. Even humming just the first three notes of the main theme of the score brings it all back.
“There was some open space between what he knew and what he tried to believe, but nothing could be done about it, and if you can’t fix it you’ve got to stand it.”
[Addendum: William Haefeli, one of my favorite New Yorker cartoonists, has a great Brokeback-related cartoon in this week’s issue. Check it out.]