Author Topic: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?  (Read 86341 times)

moremojo

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #120 on: January 11, 2008, 02:44:48 pm »
Ennis definitely is paranoid, but he had good reason to be. This is something that a lot of folks who dislike Ennis for not being more courageous and taking Jack up on his offer for that sweet life seem to overlook. Ennis had actually seen homophobia at its most brutal and vicious--his own father may have been a homophobic torturer and murderer. Homophobic violence was not some hypothetical maybe in Ennis's future, but a reality in his past and a frightening possibility in his present. Ennis was paranoid, but crazy he was not.

Offline souxi

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #121 on: January 11, 2008, 02:48:22 pm »
Ennis definitely is paranoid, but he had good reason to be. This is something that a lot of folks who dislike Ennis for not being more courageous and taking Jack up on his offer for that sweet life seem to overlook. Ennis had actually seen homophobia at its most brutal and vicious--his own father may have been a homophobic torturer and murderer. Homophobic violence was not some hypothetical maybe in Ennis's future, but a reality in his past and a frightening possibility in his present. Ennis was paranoid, but crazy he was not.

No he certainly was crazy atall, he was frightened. In one scene in the film he asked Jack if ever thought that people "knew", like they could tell when you walked down the street or went into a shop. It wasn,t just paranoia that kept him from living with Jack, it was fear.

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #122 on: January 11, 2008, 02:55:16 pm »
No he certainly was crazy atall, he was frightened. In one scene in the film he asked Jack if ever thought that people "knew", like they could tell when you walked down the street or went into a shop. It wasn,t just paranoia that kept him from living with Jack, it was fear.

That scene has always puzzled me, and I've never really given it much thought. It's also OT for this thread, but maybe Chrissi would consider making that film scene a Topic of the Week some time?

Oh, Chrissi! You listenin', Little Darlin'!  ;D  :-*
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

pnwDUDE

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #123 on: January 11, 2008, 03:06:43 pm »
Simply put, Ennis thought if people knew he could be killed. He didn't think two guys could 'ranch up' and he wasn't about to move to Denver or Sanfransisco and be like 'those guys you see around'. Call him paranoid or crazy, but it is the story of Brokeback Mountain.
Today, if Jack and Ennis road up to an inner city gay bar in their truck, dressed like they are and acting/talking like they are, guys would get all hot and bothered, but once they saw that J & E wasn't a butch act they would probably make fun of em. It wouldn't take long for Jack and Ennis to know they didn't fit in and weren't welcome there.

Brad

Scott6373

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #124 on: January 11, 2008, 03:10:02 pm »
Simply put, Ennis thought if people knew he could be killed. He didn't think two guys could 'ranch up' and he wasn't about to move to Denver or Sanfransisco and be like 'those guys you see around'. Call him paranoid or crazy, but it is the story of Brokeback Mountain.
Today, if Jack and Ennis road up to an inner city gay bar in their truck, dressed like they are and acting/talking like they are, guys would get all hot and bothered, but once they saw that J & E wasn't a butch act they would probably make fun of em. It wouldn't take long for Jack and Ennis to know they didn't fit in and weren't welcome there.

Brad

That, unfortuantely is a very true statement.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #125 on: January 11, 2008, 03:12:36 pm »
I can't imagine anyone seeing Brokeback Mountain as a story of a man who was a crazy paranoid. I believe Jack died by accident, as I said in that debate at IMDb. But I see BBM as being, in part, a story about the damaging effects of rural homophobia, in the oft-repeated words of another participant in that IMDb debate. (It's not just about homophobia; it's also a love story.)

But to the extent it is about homophobia, it is about how that societal prejudice corroded a man's life and mind and soul to the point that he couldn't be with the one he loved and ruined both their lives. The homophobia was very real -- Ennis encountered, at a very young age, about as brutal example of it as you can imagine. And Ennis' reaction to that experience, as well as to the experience of growing up with a dad who was a possibly murderous homophobe, was not at all irrational. His reaction makes perfect sense under the circumstances.

But it forever damaged the way he saw life. And in the end, it also affected the way he saw death.

To stress: People who argue that Jack died by accident are not saying homophobia doesn't exist, in life or in BBM. They're saying that this movie shows how homophobia leads to violence, both physical and emotional.


Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #126 on: January 11, 2008, 03:19:30 pm »
I think there are some very bad apples who are cops, and I think they give cops as a group a bad reputation.  And maybe things have changed in the last 25 years.  Maybe cops are more tolerant of gay people than they were then, just like the general public.  In any event, I don't think it's unreasonable to believe that the authorities in a small Texas town in the early 80's may have been unsympathetic to a gay man like Jack.  The story doesn't tell us one way or another, but it's not so far-fetched to wonder along those lines.  

I think this is a good point, Gary. When we look at this story, I think we have to be careful to keep time and place in mind, and not project backward from today. We may also need to distinguish between law enforcement officers as individuals and law enforcement as an institution of society.

At least here in the East, there is a long history of antagonism between law enforcement and the gay community. A former cheif of police and later mayor of Philadelphia, Frank Rizzo, once led a raid to bust up a gay club dressed in a tuxedo with a nightstick tucked in his cummerbund. Consider, too, that the Stonewall Riots began with a police raid on a gay bar. To tie this together, the individual officers involved in those raids may not have cared a bit that the patrons of those clubs were gay, but they had orders to carry out, and that was their job. Nevertheless there are good historical reasons for gays to be wary of the police. On the other hand, times do change. In the early 1990s the Philadelphia police were very helpful and supportive of starting a town watch in our gayborhood.

You got to do the nasty with a police officer? That's so ... hot.  ;D  ;)
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline souxi

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #127 on: January 11, 2008, 03:20:10 pm »
That scene has always puzzled me, and I've never really given it much thought. It's also OT for this thread, but maybe Chrissi would consider making that film scene a Topic of the Week some time?

Oh, Chrissi! You listenin', Little Darlin'!  ;D  :-*

I,ve gone off topic?? ahhhhhhhhhhhhh, I,m gonna be shot!!!    ;) :laugh:

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #128 on: January 11, 2008, 04:01:58 pm »
I,ve gone off topic?? ahhhhhhhhhhhhh, I,m gonna be shot!!!    ;) :laugh:


I wouldn't worry, with all the dumbass missin' around here.  ;D  :laugh:

I'm sorry, I should have said, For me to discuss that scene further here would be off topic.  :(
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline Brown Eyes

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Re: TOTW 01/08: Do you think Jack was murdered or was it an accident?
« Reply #129 on: January 11, 2008, 04:15:43 pm »
I can't imagine anyone seeing Brokeback Mountain as a story of a man who was a crazy paranoid. I believe Jack died by accident, as I said in that debate at IMDb. But I see BBM as being, in part, a story about the damaging effects of rural homophobia, in the oft-repeated words of another participant in that IMDb debate. (It's not just about homophobia; it's also a love story.)

But to the extent it is about homophobia, it is about how that societal prejudice corroded a man's life and mind and soul to the point that he couldn't be with the one he loved and ruined both their lives. The homophobia was very real -- Ennis encountered, at a very young age, about as brutal example of it as you can imagine. And Ennis' reaction to that experience, as well as to the experience of growing up with a dad who was a possibly murderous homophobe, was not at all irrational. His reaction makes perfect sense under the circumstances.

But it forever damaged the way he saw life. And in the end, it also affected the way he saw death.

To stress: People who argue that Jack died by accident are not saying homophobia doesn't exist, in life or in BBM. They're saying that this movie shows how homophobia leads to violence, both physical and emotional.



Yes, I very much agree with this.  When it comes to Ennis and his fears... I think BBM is a lot about the issue of internalized homophobia and the impact of this phenomenon on a person's life and the lives of those he loves- both his lover and his family, etc.  (in a nutshell)



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