Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
Why are we like this?
Brown Eyes:
Quote from: Penthesilea on June 16, 2006, 07:00:38 pm
--- Quote ---Nobody in real life knows how much it has affected me, how obsessed I am.
--- End quote ---
Heya, this is a really interesting thing to note. I'm the exact same way. No one in my "real life" has any idea that I'm this obsessed with BBM. Certainly no one knows that this board exists much less that I'm a moderator here, etc. A few friends know that I love the movie and some even know how many times I've seen it in the theatre, but they don't really know about the whole world of Brokie-dom. I find it sort of fun to keep it a little secret.
serious crayons:
Thanks for bumping this thread, Amanda. :D It's interesting to note that I started this thread on June 16 and, more than five months later, I still don't know the answer.
So much has happened in that time! I've spent a cumulative (mumble, mumble) days here, and plenty of additional hours on imdb, discussing every nuance of the movie. I've "met" (mostly online, but occasionally in person) lots and lots of Brokies -- some whom I have a lot in common with, and some I have very little in common with. I have found people whose paths would never in a million years have crossed mine if we didn't share this one big passion. In RL, I have good friends, compassionate and sensitive people whose opinions I otherwise respect, who don't really seem to "get" the movie and/or like it fine but aren't profoundly moved by it. When I point out why they should love it, they might gamely give it another shot but it still never really grabs them the way it does us.
So finally I've just come to shrug and accept it. I don't know why we're like this. It can't be explained in any rational way. It's almost like we've been mysteriously chosen. ???
ednbarby:
--- Quote from: latjoreme on November 29, 2006, 05:27:59 pm ---In RL, I have good friends, compassionate and sensitive people whose opinions I otherwise respect, who don't really seem to "get" the movie and/or like it fine but aren't profoundly moved by it. When I point out why they should love it, they might gamely give it another shot but it still never really grabs them the way it does us.
--- End quote ---
I have good friends like these, too. And I have to tell you all, ashamed as I am of admitting it (because it points to how arrogant I've become in my beliefs), I think less of them now than I used to. And I think more of people I didn't used to consider to be good friends because they got it. A lot more. I actually judge people based on whether they get this movie or not. It's no longer enough just to have seen it, though I certainly rate people who at least gave it a shot over those who refuse/aren't interested. You have to have seen it and been moved by it. I don't care if you're a bonafide Brokie or not - even just one viewing, as long as it haunts you, is good enough.
Am I a sick puppy, or what?
isabelle:
--- Quote from: ednbarby on November 29, 2006, 05:59:25 pm --- It's no longer enough just to have seen it, though I certainly rate people who at least gave it a shot over those who refuse/aren't interested. You have to have seen it and been moved by it. I don't care if you're a bonafide Brokie or not - even just one viewing, as long as it haunts you, is good enough.
Am I a sick puppy, or what?
--- End quote ---
Well, from another sick puppy, the answer has to be no!
I am somewhat like you, I cannot feel really close to people (even my formerly close friends) if they haven't given it a shot, or if they didn't like the film, or thought it was "ok".
I remember a similar thread on IMDb in the heyday of the BBM boards there, and mormojo (Scott) and I posted things along these lines:
"I am still processing, still trying to understand what I am going through; it feels like a spiritual experience, a spiritual awakening " (and this is from one agnostic bordering on atheism!). I am still not sure why we are like this, but our very souls certainly have been touched in a quasi spiritual way.
Someone earlier in this thread said maybe we were "chosen", in order to meet on these boards. This atheist gone barmy tends to think this theory is perfectly plausible!
All I know is that 10 months later (to the day), I am still utterly in love with the movie, with Jack and Ennis, and wondering whether this feeling will ever change; it might be altered somewhat once I have finally done what Annie said we were supposed to do (finish the story in our own real lives), but I do not think I will ever fall out of love with BBM. I have indeed been "awakened" from a boring slumber mixed with a lack of truthfulness about what I want in life and who I am (Ennis-style), and for that I will always cherish Brokeback Mountain.
God that was pretty intense and serious stuff, (hope it didn't sound too pompous) but it felt good to say it: I LOVE THIS FILM.
ednbarby:
You couldn't sound too pompous (or even pompous at all) if you tried, Isabelle.
I think that when the film art form is at its best is when a film actually changes you. I can count on one hand the films I've seen in my lifetime that I would say have done that - that have actually changed the way I look at the world and behave in it - and Brokeback Mountain is amongst them. And of the ones that I would count, Brokeback has changed me the most profoundly in that it is the only one that's helped me truly accept myself just as I am. I swear I carry myself a little straighter and taller, look people in the eye more directly and deeply, and speak with more conviction and feeling than I ever have, and that it is because of this movie and its impact on me.
To people who say "It's just a movie," I say, "OK. Then 'Romeo & Juliet' is 'just a play' and the Mona Lisa is 'just a painting.'" If they shrug that off with a "Whatever" or some such thing, I say, "Your loss." Now, THAT'S pompous. But I don't care.
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