Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
lovable subtle details
Meryl:
((((((((Janice))))))))
Brown Eyes:
I'm going to take the liberty to post a lovable subtle detail observation that came about during this past Sunday's chat/viewing of BBM. I give full credit to Lee for this one.
In the early bar scene with J & E, Lee noticed an interesting harmony between what J & E say regarding numbers. According to the screenplay, Jack says the lightning storm killed 42 sheep and Ennis talks about 43 miles. But, during the viewing I thought we heard Jack say 43 sheep which is echoed in Ennis's 43 miles more precisely. Darn... now I may have to rewatch that scene to check and see if they changed the dialogue there ever so slightly from what's written in the screenplay.
Either way... the consecutive numbers or the identical numbers... there's a poetry there to the use of numbers (something we've noticed in other instances regarding numbers in BBM in past discussions).
Front-Ranger:
--- Quote from: atz75 on February 23, 2009, 11:00:51 pm ---
In the early bar scene with J & E, Lee noticed an interesting harmony between what J & E say regarding numbers. According to the screenplay, Jack says the lightning storm killed 42 sheep and Ennis talks about 43 miles. But, during the viewing I thought we heard Jack say 43 sheep which is echoed in Ennis's 43 miles more precisely. Darn... now I may have to rewatch that scene to check and see if they changed the dialogue there ever so slightly from what's written in the screenplay.
Either way... the consecutive numbers or the identical numbers... there's a poetry there to the use of numbers (something we've noticed in other instances regarding numbers in BBM in past discussions)
--- End quote ---
I reviewed that scene, friend, and you and the screenplay were right. Jack says 42 sheep, and Ennis says 43 miles on his parents' last drive. However, that scene is very interesting for the interplay between odd and even numbers. I'm going to watch it again soon.
serious crayons:
Have we ever analyzed all the mentions of numbers to see if there's some pattern?
Pair a deuces
42 sheep
43 miles
$24 in a coffee can
40 winks
Four f'in years
17 (on the mailbox)
19 (can do what you want)
And so on. Lot of fours, but otherwise I don't see any obvious pattern. It would be interesting if something emerged, though.
Penthesilea:
Expanding your list (new items bolded):
Pair a deuces
neither of them was 20
42 sheep
43 miles
$24 in a coffee can
40 winks
coming thru on the 24th
Four f'in years
2 girls
8 months old
17 (on the mailbox)
19 (can do what you want)
One's enough (postcard from L.Higgin's shop)
--- Quote from: serious crayons on February 24, 2009, 12:04:53 pm ---Have we ever analyzed all the mentions of numbers to see if there's some pattern?
And so on. Lot of fours, but otherwise I don't see any obvious pattern. It would be interesting if something emerged, though.
--- End quote ---
We have talked about the twos, the 8 and the 17. Lots and lots of twos on the short story.
About the 17 (recapitulating from back then): the 17 on the mailbox, 17 letters in Brokeback Mountain, 17 mountain ranges listed by Proulx in the short stoy.
The 8: uh, it's so long ago. They miss August twice, the eighth month. There was more to the eight, but I don't remember right now.
But we never found (searched for?) an overall pattern of all the numbers.
There are definitively a lot of numbers, especially measured by the short length of the story.
And you're right: the four shows up very often.
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