Ten things you didn't know about Brokeback Mountainhttp://www.gaynz.com/articles/publish/20/article_5777.phpBy Matt Akersten
4th April 2008 - 01:43 pm
The Oscar-winning story of cowboy love Brokeback Mountain gets an 'outing' on TV One this Sunday night. Here's a few facts about one of the most popular movie romances of all time.
1) The Brokeback Mountain of the title was named after the shape of the hill - has the same swayback curve as a brokeback horse or mule, which is swaybacked or sagging in the spine.
2) Reports from the set of the film say Heath Ledger almost broke Jake Gyllenhaal's nose during one of the passionate kissing scenes. Down, boy!
3) The film cost US$14 million to make, and grossed well over US$83 million in North America and over US$95 million abroad during its 133-day cinema run. This makes it the fifth-highest-grossing Western-themed movie, and eighth-highest-earning romantic drama.
4) Ledger has a nude scene in which he jumps into a lake. Director Ang Lee intended to edit any actual frontal nudity out of the film, but a sneaky paparazzo took photos of him with a digital camera. The photos appeared on the net and in some gossip magazines. The scene is included in the European version of the film, featuring Ledger and a stunt double for Gyllenhaal jumping into a lake from a rock.
5) Brokeback was banned from release in Chinese cinemas, with authorities there claiming that the audience would be too small to justify its release… yeah right! The movie later became freely available throughout China on copied DVD and video, and was very well received with reviews on Chinese radio, television, newspapers and magazines, despite the fact that homosexuality is still such a taboo subject there. Brokeback was also not officially shown in any Middle Eastern cinema except on a few screens in Lebanon.
6) While Brokeback isn't a CGI masterpiece like Lord of the Rings, it did require several visual effects to be added to original footage. The script called for about 2,500 sheep, but only 700 were on-set, so many more were added digitally. Also created by computer boffins were replacement skies, set additions, equipment erasures and even the hail in the hailstorm scene.
7) When Ledger was asked about any fear of being cast in Brokeback, he responded that he was not afraid of the role, but instead was concerned that he would not be 'mature enough as an actor' to do justice to the story. At first he was going to turn down the role of Ennis Del Mar, but his then girlfriend Naomi Watts encouraged him to take it.
8 After completion of the movie, Brokeback writer Annie Proulx sent both lead actors an original, autographed copy of her story. When she signed Jake's copy she wrote "To Jake...", but when she signed the copy for Heath, she accidentally wrote "To Ennis…" After continuing her personal message, she realized her mistake - but decided to leave it there. In a private screening later in Hollywood, she reflected that she left his signed copy that way because she felt Heath Ledger had embodied Ennis in every way she had wrote him.
9) A pair of shirts seen in the wardrobe the end of the film sold on eBay.com in February 2006 for US$101,100.51. The buyer was film historian and movie memorabilia collector Tom Gregory, who called the shirts "the ruby slippers of our time," and vowed he'd never separate them.
10) Heath Ledger would have turned 29 years old today, 4 April 2008. R.I.P.
Brokeback Mountain is broadcast at 8.30pm this Sunday 6 April on TV One. The official theatre trailer for the film is shown below.
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