BetterMost, Wyoming & Brokeback Mountain Forum
Our BetterMost Community => The Polling Place => Topic started by: Phillip Dampier on February 11, 2006, 07:50:06 pm
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A quick poll about the movie's impact....
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Phillip,
Great polling subject. Just wanted to say that I was really torn between #2 - Empathy for the characters; and #3 - Remembrance of past unfullfilled or problematic relationships. Chronologically, #2 hit me first and really hard, then, quite a while later, #3 hit; LOL - I am still sorting all that out. Ended up chosing #3, because #2 exculded the possibility of #3.
Moni
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Great poll Phillip!
I 'm one of the few that chose the last option.
For me I really was affected by Ennis' lonliness and how solitary he was and saw this movie mainly through that prism.
I mean, yes I get the other issues and empathize, but I most identified with the lonliness and solitude.
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i think for me, first and foremost is grieving for the story and the characters. that then opened up the can of worms that is my life issues. I don't think it would have made me confront myself, if I story didn't move me so much.
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Indeed Phillip, Good poll!
I voted "Reminder of Past Unfulfilled or Problematic Relationships in My Own Life".
Yup, this movie hit wayyy too close to home.
Hopefully, (crosses fingers) that is all behind me now. ;)
David
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I predict within the year psycological journals will be discussing "Ennis Syndrome" breaking out among closeted gay men of a certain age. Like a midlife crisis on steroid, That will be the longest impact of the story. I dearly hope it brings relief and answers to people, I am very fearful some have been pushed to the edge.
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I voted 'problematic relationship in my life now'. I wonder WHEN the effect of this film ends, or it might just be me being particularly slow: I haven't seen BBM for 3 weeks since they pulled it, and here we cannot get hold of the DVD till the end of April. I saw it 5 times, and am still thinking about it. It was such an earthquake in my life, that it is affecting me in one way after another, going deeper and deeper and deeper - never seeming to end. Today (yes, only today!), I started feeling that what this movie forces me to face up to, is that at the end of the day, if I am still with the same person I've been with for 7 years, it is because the Brokeback time we had together the first year still has a huge hold on me. But it comes down to this: I am like Jack in his final confrontation with Ennis by the lake. Under the spell of that dozy embrace that lasted a year, but feeling bitter now. Living with the memory of love.
On a lighter note, I have to ask myself: What would Jack do?
I always thought he was going to stay with Ennis anyhow. If I do, I'm afraid I may end up with a lover myself...
Phillip, I take this opportunity to thank you for this great place. I love it more than Chez Tremblay, when I almost quitted after the madness there lately!
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..................click to enlarge, and you can move it around...
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I would say loneliness. The film from start to end records Ennis's sad lonely life. The scenery and music add to the feeling. So much open space and then two guys who cannot say "I love you" and feel together. Then Jack is killed....
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Mike, I'm glad you're here and posting on these polls -- they're ones I've somehow missed before and now I'm glad to find them.
My answer was empathy with the characters. There ARE actually reminders of my own life in the film. But my emotional reaction has less to do with those connections to my own life than how involved I get in theirs.
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Thinking more about this movie I think loneliless is not the real issue bot LOSS.
I am not sure the author visulised it this way but loss is what nnis is about. He lost all his family either thru death or marriage. Then he lost his family thru divorce. Finally and probably the greatest loss was Jack....and not just the physical Jack but all the promise that held for the future. While alive Jack hld some hope for Ennis but with his death (the aftermath of which Ennis was excluded from... his cremation, and where to place his ashes) Ennis lost the one hope of saying goodbye to his true partner. What can be said but sad beyond words....
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I have tremendous empathy for the characters (my goodness, I've even fallen in love with Jack and Ennis), but I went with 'Lost Opportunities & Things I Never Accomplished', as the film has made me yearn all the stronger to experience the kind of love that Ennis and Jack knew, however compromised its circumstances were. Some people will never know the kind of bond that the boys were blessed to find in each other, and that thought saddens me quite a bit. That is my hope, to fall in love before I die.
If the 'Empathy for the Characters' option did not exclude tie-ins to my own life, I would have chosen that.
Scott
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Lost opportunities, definately.
There are several scenes in Brokeback Mountain that nearly smack me across my face when I see them. It makes me stop and think: "If I had only said something", "If I had only NOT said that", "If I had only not been so distant"...
A lot of "If I had only's"....
It's serves as a wake up call for me sometimes. :o
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Definitely "Reminder of Past Unfulfilled or Problematic Relationships in My Own Life" for me, for reasons I have already explained in several other threads over the years.
"Years"? Did I just say "years"? Yikes, hard to believe I'm coming up to my third anniversary here at BetterMost! Where have those years gone?