Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
Ennis and Old Man Twist
Brown Eyes:
--- Quote from: latjoreme on May 23, 2006, 03:57:14 pm ---Well, I'm happy to post for you, but I'll warn you, my threads have a way of sinking like stones. Pretty good with other people's threads, though!
--- End quote ---
LOL. :D
Awww, Katherine come on! Your threads are great.
--- Quote ---Yay! We can keep these threads going for months and months. I would gladly spend that much time scrutinizing every single one of Ennis' facial expressions. (Hell, I already have spent that much time doing that!
--- End quote ---
LOL. This reminds me of that funny thread from TOB where someone catalogued all of Ennis's "huh" and "hunh" and "hmmmm" and "mmmm" lines.
:laugh:
By the way, thanks to everyone for all the wonderful posts in this thread! Some really interesting ideas circulating here.
Mikaela:
--- Quote from: atz75 on May 23, 2006, 08:40:25 pm ---I feel that this assertiveness is true of Jack in almost every case except for with his Dad. I don't have any great proof or reasoning for this, but I feel like Jack would be pretty intimidated by his Dad.
--- End quote ---
I agree that Jack can be every bit as assertive as Ennis, and then some. But their differing degree of self-confidence gives their assertiveness different triggerpoints, it seems.
Ennis has next to no self-confidence at all. He takes every slight and possible insult much more personally as a result, and either stews on it in hurt but seemingly unaffected silence, I think - or explodes in uncontrolled rage if there's a sexual connotation involved.
Jack on the other hand has a good deal of self-confidence, but also a very disarming ability to laugh at himself and to not take himself too seriously. It takes quite a lot for him to become overtly assertive - he knows and believes in his own worth, he doesn't feel the need to get up all in arms every time someone steps on his toes. (The Thanksgiving show-down in my opinion is partly due to his sense of obligation towards Bobby. The boy needs a father to be proud of; - and moreover he needs to be "saved" from having LD as his (only) role model. If not for his son's sake, I'm not entirely certain Jack would have bothered with the tension of having an open confrontation with LD, no matter what his father-in-law might think to say to provoke him.)
Now, how Jack ever got that healthy self-confidence is a bit of a mystery to me. Growing up on that lonely farm with *that* unsupporting, ever displeased and negative father? (I'm taking Jack's statements about his father at face value in this - how his father never came to see him bullriding, never taught him anything, how he couldn't ever please his father, no way.... The one meeting we have with old man Twist certainly doesnt do anything to contradict Jack's tales of his father. I'm also keeping the short story's tale of child abuse out of the equation since it's not in the film.) Jack's mother must have been the main force and supportive constant in Jack's life and development for him to become the character we get to know. But inevitably I think that whenever grown-up Jack had dealings with his father, he'd find it hard to shake the feelings of the boy who never measured up to his father's expectations, of being seen as inferior, not quite good enough - all that his father instilled in him from childhood. Plus, there must have been a strong feeling of resentment. I think much of Jack's normal self-confidence evaporated where his father was concerned. I wonder if he'd bothered going back home to visit if his father had been a widower. I guess not. But perhaps he'd still be trying to impress his father into approving of him at last - if he couldn't do it through bull-riding, perhaps he could do it through eventually "whipping the farm into shape".
(It's awfully late here, so apologies if this post is even less coherent than usual.)
Brown Eyes:
--- Quote from: Mikaela on May 23, 2006, 09:29:01 pm ---Ennis has next to no self-confidence at all. He takes every slight and possible insult much more personally as a result, and either stews on it in hurt but seemingly unaffected silence, I think - or explodes in uncontrolled rage if there's a sexual connotation involved.
Jack on the other hand has a good deal of self-confidence, but also a very disarming ability to laugh at himself and to not take himself too seriously. It takes quite a lot for him to become overtly assertive - he knows and believes in his own worth, he doesn't feel the need to get up all in arms every time someone steps on his toes. (The Thanksgiving show-down in my opinion is partly due to his sense of obligation towards Bobby. The boy needs a father to be proud of; - and moreover he needs to be "saved" from having LD as his (only) role model. If not for his son's sake, I'm not entirely certain Jack would have bothered with the tension of having an open confrontation with LD, no matter what his father-in-law might think to say to provoke him.)
Now, how Jack ever got that healthy self-confidence is a bit of a mystery to me.
--- End quote ---
Hi Mikaela,
Thanks for your post/ posts here! They're really interesting. Well I think these points are particularly interesting. I think you're right about Jack's self-confidence and about the reasons for his Thanksgiving outburst. But, as you mentioned trigger points... It seems important to note the specific trigger point in his out rage at LD. Here there's a similarity with Ennis. It's after LD says "you want you're son to grow up to be a man, don't you daughter?" that Jack snaps. So, his anger had been building but it's when LD comes the closest to making an outright homophobic remark that Jack boils over. Also, it's interesting that LD directs his comment specifically to Lureen here as if the point he's making would be lost on Jack or something. A double insult at least.
As to where Jack gets his self confidence... well I think it's from his Mom! She demonstrates quite a good deal of ability in circumventing John Twist's hostility even in Ennis's brief visit. She really is very subversive in her quiet way. If you think about it... what do we think the over-riding impression was for Ennis coming away from Lightning Flat? Yes he was dismayed, angered and hurt by John Twist, but I'm quite sure his most important impression must have been Mrs. Twist's kindness, respect and her nods of approval in Ennis finding the shirts. I would think he'd be amazed and heartened at this (especially because he goes about the world expecting people to be hostile towards anything that hints at homosexuality... instead here in Mrs. Twist he finds the opposite). So maybe Mrs. Twists kindnesses to Jack as he grew up somehow managed to outweigh John Twist's hurtful behavior so that Jack would be able to go out into the world feeling pretty self-assured (although not perfectly so).
opinionista:
--- Quote ---On a more serious note, in the book it's made pretty clear (and it's hinted in the film) that John Twist was pretty abusive to Jack. How would Ennis have reacted to seeing Jack berated by his father?
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Ennis would probably feel bad about it but I don't think he'd intervene, unless things get really out of hand. I guess Ennis would figure that Jack is a big boy who knows how to handle his own father. Besides, by the time they moved to Lightning Flat, John C. would be an old man already in need of help. Maybe on the inside he would not approve their relationship and even despise Ennis. He might let out a nasty comment or two, but in general he would keep it to himself in order to have Jack around. I'm sure he loved his son, he probably didn't understand him, but he loved Jack.
opinionista:
--- Quote ---The Thanksgiving show-down in my opinion is partly due to his sense of obligation towards Bobby. The boy needs a father to be proud of; - and moreover he needs to be "saved" from having LD as his (only) role model. If not for his son's sake, I'm not entirely certain Jack would have bothered with the tension of having an open confrontation with LD, no matter what his father-in-law might think to say to provoke him.
--- End quote ---
I'm not sure about this. When LD takes the carving knife from Jack and says the stud duck does the turkey carving, Jack even apologizes like a little boy, and sits down. He later gets angry but I don't think it was because he suddenly realizes he has to set an example for his son and wife. His anger is fueled by years and years of frustration with his life. Nothing has come out the way he wanted, not one single dream of his came true. He gets tired of playing second fiddle to everybody and explodes at that very moment, that's all. It has nothing to do with Bobby.
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