Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
P.O. Boxes, Mailboxes and the No. 17
Brown Eyes:
--- Quote from: Front-Ranger on September 18, 2007, 10:05:11 am ---Random revelation from the Castro showing:
When we see Ennis applying the numbers to the mailbox, there is a glimpse of a pickup truck in the background. It looks like Jack's old red truck, a '66 Ford, but there's a difference. Instead of being red and white, it is solid red!! What does this mean??
--- End quote ---
This is a very excellent revelation Sister-Mod! I've never noticed that detail before. I think the trucks in the background function much like the black and white hats in the backgrounds of certain scenes.
OK... so I have a mail related question. Forgive me if we've covered this before.
In Jack's first postcard he writes, "Heard you was in Riverton." How would he have heard this?
TOoP/Bruce:
Regarding my previous Hitchcock reference, in "Psycho", the number 17 can be seen on the wall in the police station when the psychiatrist explains about Norman's past...
Coincidence?
Shakesthecoffecan:
The Number 17 having been discussed beyond my ability to take it all in, I would like to add that I think that Ennis having a mailbox is meaningful in that:
1. He has given up the P.O. Box necessitated by frequest moves, it was a place where Jack could reach him.
2. The P.O. Box was also a place where a postcard could remain safe from many eyes before he saw it. In a mailbox it could get stolen by neighbors.
3. It was symbolic in that he was acknowledging that he was going to be right there, was not going anywhere else, and that the only opportunity he may ever have to live elsewhere was gone.
Now I never understood why he was in Higgins Gift Shop. He never struck me as the kind of person who would go into a gift shop.
serious crayons:
I'd like to analyze the Higgins gift shop scene, because I've never fully understood it. The one thing that stands out for me is when Linda Higgins offers to get him a hunderd (why on earth would he want a hunderd??) and he says,
"One's enough."
One -- as in one lifetime love -- is, indeed, enough for Ennis.
But what else? But what about the part where he washes the horse blankets? And what about when she throws a sopping brown coffee filter into the garbage can? Is it significant that Linda wonders if the Brokeback Mountain he's talking about is in Fremont -- that is, free mountain -- County?
Shakesthecoffecan:
It could be that she is concerned with inventory, knows that 100 is the minimum order and how long it will take to get rid of the other 99.
The sopping wet coffee filter, hum, I'll have to study on that one. Okay the coffee pot- they always have a coffe pot and Ennis is always looking for the handle. Here is an example of how he is further marginalized, out of his element ina gift shop where they use a machine to make coffee. In the begining of the story he is reheating coffee in an enamel pot. Stale coffee he has saved and Linda, who is not used to privation, casually tosses away the sacred grounds.
The inside of Annie Proulx's mind must be an incredible place.
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