The Dozy Embrace

[SFEnnisSF]

Like many folks, I wanted to see more of them on the mountain in the movie.  I felt the movie was actually a little too reserved in showing their affections on the mountain.

Many audience members I think felt the same way.   Many comments of "they were just friends" and "sex out of nowhere", and "I didn't see the love", etc. etc.

I'm reading the March 2004 script (with revisions by James Schamus), and I just read the scene where the Dozy Embrace was originally in the beginning of the movie, inbetween the Chilean sheep tangle and the first snowfall.

Would it have hurt them to have left the Dozy Embrace there, and also again flash-backed to it briefly during the Lake Fight Scene?  Also, in reading this script, it seems the Dozy Embrace scene was supposed to be a little more drawn out that what we see. 

I think it would have been highly effective to have the Dozy Embrace scene in the first half of the movie and to then have quickly flashed-back to it in the Lake Fight Scene.  I think it would have cleared up a lot of confusion over the scene inserted in the Fight scene to begin with.  Also, it would have softened all those hard feelings of "they were just friends" etc. by showing just a tad more affection toward eachother during the first half of the movie. 

Here's a copy of the script I'm reading.  The blue text is the deleted scenes (or moved scenes) from the original screenplay...

Click to enlarge:

[mvansand76]

Hey Eric,

I have to admit, I wasn't disappointed about the Flashback scene being where it was in the movie, I kind of liked that, I think it adds to the poignancy of the fight scene more than if it had already been shown in the first part of the movie. In the book the scene suprises you, because you never really knew for sure how intimate they really were on the mountain, but in the movie we have TS2.

What I do agree on is that after TS2 the time on the mountain is gone before you know it, and that really disappointed me, and I know that Ang Lee must've meant by that that the good times are over before you know it, but hell, I never really got the time to get into the it's just the two of us in paradise" feeling.

It's just like that they left out the "That's one a the two things I need right now..." scene that I absolutely adored in the movie and that, in my opinion, should definitely have been in the movie because it would have shown that the deep love they feel is still there, which would have softened the blow of the fight scene. The omission of that scene I regard as the biggest flaw of the movie.

[moremojo]

The movie is constructed in a very sophisticated way to reveal the extent of Ennis and Jack's feelings in increments, and over a chronologically broad span of time. The dozy embrace flashback was pivotal for me, in showing that the two had fallen in love on the mountain, during that very first summer in 1963; this colored everything else the film had presented up to that point in a new light.

I think a lot of people approach the film as something I don't think it was meant to be--a romantic/erotic film. The story is one of love, for sure (among other things), but the point was to show love taking root and surviving under very constricted and arid circumstances. The film's terse style helps to convey this sense of aridity, and of there never being enough time (and love, for that matter). Also, it should be remembered that Ennis is a seriously flawed and broken human being--he was never able to fully give of himself to Jack, and perhaps never could have.

[miniangel]

I think we got short-changed with the film Dozy Embrace. It was a bit perfunctory. A few more seconds wouldn't have gone astray.

Placing an earlier version after the Chilean sheep business wouldn't have fitted with the original story, I don't think. I doubt that Ennis could have been so intimate with Jack once his feelings became "mixed". I'm more inclined to see the DE leading to the night spent with Jack (i.e. the following night)

I was happy that we only got the one viewing of the DE. Despite the addition of TS2 the film still managed to give a non-romantic view of their time on the mountain which then lent poignancy to the DE, in much the same way it hits you in the story.

[loneleeb3]

I so agree with ya Bud!
I could watch that all day.
It would have been perfect placed there!

Like many folks, I wanted to see more of them on the mountain in the movie.  I felt the movie was actually a little too reserved in showing their affections on the mountain.

Many audience members I think felt the same way.   Many comments of "they were just friends" and "sex out of nowhere", and "I didn't see the love", etc. etc.

I'm reading the March 2004 script (with revisions by James Schamus), and I just read the scene where the Dozy Embrace was originally in the beginning of the movie, inbetween the Chilean sheep tangle and the first snowfall.

Would it have hurt them to have left the Dozy Embrace there, and also again flash-backed to it briefly during the Lake Fight Scene?  Also, in reading this script, it seems the Dozy Embrace scene was supposed to be a little more drawn out that what we see. 

I think it would have been highly effective to have the Dozy Embrace scene in the first half of the movie and to then have quickly flashed-back to it in the Lake Fight Scene.  I think it would have cleared up a lot of confusion over the scene inserted in the Fight scene to begin with.  Also, it would have softened all those hard feelings of "they were just friends" etc. by showing just a tad more affection toward eachother during the first half of the movie. 

Here's a copy of the script I'm reading.  The blue text is the deleted scenes (or moved scenes) from the original screenplay...

Click to enlarge: