The End of Brokeback Mountain (Massive Spoilers)- Page 3

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:34pm

Whatever the method of stamping the postcard, the return address was there. So if Lurleen wanted to contact Ennis she could have. I think she knew about them, somehow. But how did she find out? Perhaps it WAS a gay bashing and she put two and two together...but you would think she would be bitter enough to throw that in Ennis' face when he did call. She is obviously bitter about something when he calls...and there really is no indication that their marriage was that bad. Remember, she is rather proud when Jack finally stands up to her Father. So something must have happened to make her so cold to Ennis.

Updated On: 12/20/05 at 12:34 PM

[SonofMammaMiaSam]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:37pm

she had a visit from her monthly friend?

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:38pm

That's a good point; I suppose if she knows, or even suspects, that something was going on between them, maybe she's bitter that he's the reason she didn't have all of Jack's love. Or something. I was reading the Times review, and it said something about how by the end, she had basically become a shell of her previously very vivacious self -- so I think some of that bitterness also has to do with how she's changed over time.

Updated On: 12/20/05 at 12:38 PM

[SueleenGay]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:42pm

In my opinion it is a hard scene to read because of the actress. She is hampered by a bad wig (yes, period,I know) and it is hard to tell what are acting choices and what is just a young actress trying to play something that is beyond her. The way her last scene is shot was very odd, too. The close up just seemed awkward, as if the camera was going to pull back and reveal someone else was with her in the room (that might explain why she was not being totally forthcoming to Ennis) But we never see that so we will never know.

[SonofMammaMiaSam]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:45pm

Maybe it was her monthly friend looming in the shadows. Oh, this isn't a Hitchcock film?
Updated On: 12/20/05 at 12:45 PM

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:47pm

Uh, I think the reason, even had she stamped it, that she would not be able to contact Ennis is that mail to Ennis was always addressed General Post in Riverton, WY. She had no address and so the easiest way was to just return the mail.
But I will buy that it's possible a simple phone call to the post office in her hometown had them return all mail addressed to her deceased husband.

[SonofMammaMiaSam]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 12:49pm

I haven't seen this much dissection since Mr. Toady gave it up in eighth grade Biology class.

[RobbO]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 2:23pm

"and there really is no indication that their marriage was that bad."

sueleen, remember though that jack said that "they could do their marriage over the phone" and that his wife had become a real whiz at running the family business and he basically was given a fancy title. it sounds like they were a business partnership and didn't want to rock the boat.

plus, we obviously know that jack is not a happy man and would leave his wife and son for ennis, and later, for the other rancher.

i think his wife's actions on the phone was just someone who was numb and covering up something. i'm sure after 20 years together, she got a sense that her husband wasn't there for her - whether or not she knew he was gay - she probably knew he was "stepping out."

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 9:00pm

Bump because I don't like threads that have spoilers in their f*cking TITLES. This is an example of a good thread.

Updated On: 12/20/05 at 09:00 PM

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 9:00pm

Double post; see, I mean business.

And I agree, RobbO.

Updated On: 12/20/05 at 09:00 PM

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 9:22pm

I love LUV.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/20/05 at 9:45pm

And *I* ruv YOU!

[RobbO]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 8:42am

are you saying that you like spoilers to be in the thread title or you don't like spoilers to be in the thread title?

[DG]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 8:56am

I think she means she likes the spoiler warning in the thread title - or just definitive thread titles in general.

[RobbO]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 9:04am

i thought so and figured that this sentence was missing another "don't" :

"Bump because I don't like threads that have spoilers in their f*cking TITLES."

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 9:16am

You missed it -- last night, some asshole posted a thread whose title was "So who REALLY killed Jack--" and I said that he should change that before he ruined the movie for half the board, and he told me no, because if you didn't already know the ending, you were living under a rock, and "not one in Central Park." I was mad. It got deleted.

So I meant I don't like threads like that. The guy had the biggest spoiler IN the title; you didn't even have to click the thread to see it.

Updated On: 12/21/05 at 09:16 AM

[RobbO]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 9:22am

that's just ignorant. i'm not even a fan of threads of movies that have the review grade in them since i like to know absolutely nothing about a film when i see it.

i knew there was something tragic in the movie but i didn't know what it was or who died. i would have been really pissed if i saw that thread before i saw the movie.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 9:25am

See, even if a thread says "spoilers!!" I'll probably read it, because I'm far, far too curious for my own good. So, I knew Jack died before I saw the movie. But I got so mad at this guy because after seeing it, I felt it was too powerful for him to go around ruining it for everybody, with the ending right there in the open. You couldn't even decide if you looked at it or not. It just wasn't fair.

I guess knowing sort of changed how I saw it -- of course, each time they were together I was like "please don't let this be the last," and I was kind of dreading his death. I also figured since I knew it was coming, I wouldn't be that sad, but I was wrong.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 9:44am

Oh, stupid question: where is there a full list of release dates? The official website only has where it's showing as of 12/16, but I want to know when I can see it in my annoying little suburb of a town.

[broadway86]

Posted: 12/21/05 at 11:39pm

When Ennis said "Jack, I swear..." at the end, I think he meant that he would get the ashes and put them where Jack wanted them to be.

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 12/22/05 at 2:15am

I just finished Proulx's short story, and although it touches a bit more on Jack's fate, it doesn't really give us anything conclusive.

After the suspicions of gay-bashing raised by Jack's wife, Proulx's narrative states that Ennis is convinced upon speaking with his father. However, Jack's father doesn't say anything that would steer Ennis to think that his son was, indeed, gaybashed.

Instead, the image of the "tire iron" from Ennis' childhood memory keeps popping up, as if he is fishing for clues to confirm his suspicions about Jack being murdered in the same way as the man from his childhood. But Proulx doesn't offer any evidence a gay bashing is indeed what happened; she keeps this intentional ambiguous. What she makes clear, though, is that Ennis is convinced that that was how Jack died.

[Auggie27]

Posted: 12/23/05 at 3:45pm

Even though the flashcut of the gruesome death is totally in Ennis' point of view, I still believe it has the power of an omincient piece of plot information. That Ennis intuits the actual way he died, and since it's a film, we are thus privy to it in that moment. That to me is what makes it resonate for all of us -- it's both at once: about Ennis's worse fear, and a literal representation of how that fear was realized.

And I think the wife was numbed, having told the cover story 100 times. And knew exactly the weight Ennis played in Jack's life, without ever knowing facts. Sueleen: the fact that the camera didn't pull back was designed, I believe, to show the degree of numbness. We never could absorb her in her context. It was just a numbed out zombie, unable to put together the pieces of her husband's life and death.

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 12/23/05 at 3:52pm

So Auggie, you believe that Lureen lied and Jack did die in a hate crime?

According to an interview with Charlie Rose, Lee's interpretation is that Lureen is definitely hiding something, but Proulx's short story doesn't offer anything. I'd like to think that she was telling the truth, only because if Jack did die in a hate crime, then Ennis was right all along: they would have been killed if they had shared a life together. That's a rather morbid message. But if Jack died in an accident, then we could rightly argue that Ennis could have lived, and could still live, a life that was true to his sexual nature.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 12/23/05 at 4:06pm

I think that even if we're supposed to deduce that Jack's wife is lying, and that he did die in a hate crime, the message isn't necessarily as morbid as simply being that Ennis would've been right, and if they did live together they'd have been killed. Yes, that would be true, but the message, to me, wouldn't simply be "if you do this, you'll die a horrible death;" but rather, that this is something that did, does, and still could happen, and that it needs to change. That's what I think is supposed to be taken from the possibility that Jack's death was the result of a hate crime.

Updated On: 12/23/05 at 04:06 PM

[broadway86]

Posted: 12/23/05 at 4:38pm

I think that Lureen was telling the truth, but that Ennis imagined a different scenario. I thought Anne Hathaway was great in that scene.