Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
Post-Divorce Scene
Jeff Wrangler:
--- Quote from: marlb42 on January 25, 2007, 07:20:57 pm ---I have been wondering about it since i read the last few messages and Jeff's question . And I started wondering, and I know that some of you will strongly disagree with me, wasn't the whole relationship much more about sex for Jack then for Ennis? I do agree with the original question here, is that why Jack went straight to Mexico after the post divorce meeting. What I still cannot get about that scene is why couldn't Jack have just waited around until Ennis brought the girls back home to Alma?
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Exactly! That's a very good question, and you aren't the first to ask it, and I think it's just not answered in the film. Or, why couldn't he go visit his folks up in Lightning Flat for a week and come back the next weekend, when, presumably, Ennis didn't have the girls? We just don't know. ???
--- Quote ---I mean to me it just seemed like Ennis was explaining that he had the girls that weekend so he couldn't go off with Jack at that moment. I don't really understand what he expecting, Ennis to just leave the girls at his shack and run off with Jack? The fact that he had this reaction and then goes to Mexico makes me think it was much more so about the sex for Jack than for Ennis.
I think for Ennis it was about everything, after all he was not even capable of having any kind of meaningful or successful life without Jack, but Jack was.
Also the line that gets me about this whole subject is " You have no idea how bad it gets, I'm not like you, I can't get by on a couple of high altitude f**ks a couple of times a year." So is that all Jack was thinking of, he wanted more high altitude meetings a year to have sex?
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Well, I think the fact that Jack kept the shirts all those years indicates that it is more than just about sex for him, but I also think he has a greater need for the sex than Ennis does.
--- Quote ---And I think the ironic thing to this line was Ennis did know how bad it gets, it was much much worse for him, and not just about the sex
(yes, I admit I do see it all from Ennis's side)
--- End quote ---
Nothing wrong with that. I identify more with Ennis, myself. :)
Cameron:
--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on January 25, 2007, 07:31:32 pm ---
Well, I think the fact that Jack kept the shirts all those years indicates that it is more than just about sex for him, but I also think he has a greater need for the sex than Ennis does.
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Yes, it is true about the shirts. I don't think that it is just about the sex for Jack, but also the shirts were from the first summer, when Jack was very young and totally infatuated with Ennis. I really do thing that over all the years Jack was able to develop something of a life without Ennis, and it did somehow become more about the sex to him. In fact I tend to think that he even was able to maintain an affectionate and friendly partnership with Lureen, something Ennis could not do with either Alma or Cassie, and so over the years the sex was more and more important because he didn't need Ennis as much emotionally.
For Ennis, I really think Jack was everything. However until I focused on TS 1 the past few days I didn't really think that the sex was all that important for him, but then I realized that actually it was very very important.
But to me Ennis is so incredibly tragic because he really was 'nowwhere and nothing' because he really was the one who truly needed Jack, for everything, emotionally and sexually, and he never ever had any kind of life because of Jack.
OK now that I am started on this, I think that the underlying story and the tragedy of everything is that Jack was never ever able to see and understand Ennis's feelings and needs and desperation for him, for Jack it was just what he wanted and needed.
To me Ennis's was screaming out the truth to Jack, at least in ways that he could, but Jack didn't get it.
I don't think that it was that Ennis never could commit, I think that Jack never truly understood.
Sorry all Jack fans, its just what I believe, and yes I think it is mostly about the sex for him.
serious crayons:
--- Quote from: marlb42 on January 25, 2007, 07:20:57 pm ---What I still cannot get about that scene is why couldn't Jack have just waited around until Ennis brought the girls back home to Alma?
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--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on January 25, 2007, 07:31:32 pm ---Exactly! That's a very good question, and you aren't the first to ask it, and I think it's just not answered in the film. Or, why couldn't he go visit his folks up in Lightning Flat for a week and come back the next weekend, when, presumably, Ennis didn't have the girls? We just don't know. ???
--- End quote ---
The girls are a legitimate reason for Ennis to turn Jack down at that moment. But even without them, Ennis would have turned down what Jack had in mind -- i.e., living together. Jack interpreted the postcard about the divorce to mean that, with Alma out of the way, Ennis was ready for a little cow-and-calf operation. That's as much a reason he was all happy driving to see Ennis as he was about anticipating sex.
During their interaction outside the truck, Jack realized that he'd made a mistake -- Ennis was never going to want to live with him. Maybe one reason is that Ennis himself doesn't suggest that Jack wait around and come back later. But the bigger reason is the way Ennis watches the white pickup truck go past. If Ennis can't even feel safe talking to Jack in the driveway, how is he ever going to agree to live in the same house? And Jack, following Ennis' gaze and seeing his expression, gets the picture.
When he decides to redline it to Mexico, he's disappointed and embittered. He has a "Well, I'll show him!" kind of attitude. But you can tell by the look on his face as he starts down Prostitute Street that he's got mixed feelings, at best, about resorting to that. Not exactly the look he had when singing "King of the Road," hunh? That's another difference, IMO, between love and sex.
Oh, marlb42, your post came in while I was writing this. I'll post this first, then see if I have a response to your new post.
Cameron:
--- Quote from: latjoreme on January 25, 2007, 08:25:51 pm ---During their interaction outside the truck, Jack realized that he'd made a mistake -- Ennis was never going to want to live with him. Maybe one reason is that Ennis himself doesn't suggest that Jack wait around and come back later. But the bigger reason is the way Ennis watches the white pickup truck go past. If Ennis can't even feel safe talking to Jack in the driveway, how is he ever going to agree to live in the same house? And Jack, following Ennis' gaze and seeing his expression, gets the picture.
When he decides to redline it to Mexico, he's disappointed and embittered. He has a "Well, I'll show him!" kind of attitude. But you can tell by the look on his face as he starts down Prostitute Street that he's got mixed feelings, at best, about resorting to that. Not exactly the look he had when singing "King of the Road," hunh? That's another difference, IMO, between love and sex.
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Hi Katherine/latjorene,
I answer yours, mine went in a different direction. I actually do agree with you totally, I do, but I still do see it differently. I mean what I cannot understand, if Jack thought the divorce postcard was to telll Jack that they can finally really be together, well I don't really understand why Jack would really think this. I understand that this is what he wanted the postcard about the divorce to mean, but if he really did understand Ennis he would have known that it couldn't mean that.
I guess that goes along with my view that Jack didn't really understand Ennis, after all Ennis was upset at the divorce, and maybe the postcard was just Ennis trying to tell Jack that he needed him.
Yes, I do agree that going off to Mexico was not without a lot of misgivings, and obviously it was not JUST about the sex with Ennis, but I still think that Jack never understood the realy meanings of what Ennis was always trying to tell him, even without direct words.
Brown Eyes:
Jeff, I think you point about your change in perception of this scene is very interesting. And, it is an interesting exercise to try to see it with fresh eyes. But, I also think this observation relates to what many of us have been saying for a long time, which is that this movie takes on quite a lot of meaning (different meaning, more subtle meaning, questions become more exposed, etc.) the more it's watched and the more one ponders the movie. I know people who upon first viewing of the film didn't even think to question how Jack died. It didn't even cross their minds to question what we're shown on screen (as a representation of Ennis's fears and imagination). It took them either a second or third viewing or it took a Brokie ( :D ) to point out the question that should arise over that topic.
marlb42, to comment on just one of your (very good!) observations, I think sex very well may have been more important to Jack. I think Jack acknowledges this in the late argument by the lake when he yells "I'm not you, I can't make it... [etc., etc., etc.]. I think the physical part of their relationship is (of course) important to them both, but maybe in a different way to each of them.
--- Quote from: latjoreme on January 25, 2007, 08:25:51 pm ---When he decides to redline it to Mexico, he's disappointed and embittered. He has a "Well, I'll show him!" kind of attitude. But you can tell by the look on his face as he starts down Prostitute Street that he's got mixed feelings, at best, about resorting to that. Not exactly the look he had when singing "King of the Road," hunh? That's another difference, IMO, between love and sex.
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Yup, I totally agree that Jack left right away after his encounter with Ennis and headed to Mexico (what I perceive to be quite a spontaneous decision) out of anger and frustration. I don't think Jack wanted to be around Ennis while he was as upset as he was either. He probably wouldn't want Ennis to see him cry or to expose how raw his nerves were at that juncture to Ennis.
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