Over the past two nights I have been watching a tremendous movie, Heaven's Gate. You have probably heard of it, it has been called the greatest big budget flops of all time.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080855/Released in 1980, it stars Kris Kristofferson, Isabelle Huppert, Jeff Bridges, Christopher Walken, Willem Dafoe, Sam Waterston, Joseph Cotton and T-Bone Burnett. It was written and directed by Michael Cimino, who also directed The Deer Hunter and has nothing to do with the Heaven's Gate Cult who in 1997 committed mass suicide. It is a loosely fictionalized story of the 1890 Johnson County Range War between the local Cattlemen's Association and the predominently easter European settlers. It is a loooooooog movie, 3 hr. and 39 minutes and that had been cut down from over 5 hrs. from what I read. In recent years however it has come to be recognized as a classic, and I would agree with that.
It is a beautiful and richly layered film, shot primarily in Glacier National Park in Montana, not that far from where Brokeback was filmed in Alberta. Each scene is a story unto itself, doing into the detail of the lives people lead at the time. I had heard people in the past whail about the characters roller skating, but it does seem to be historically accurate. The rollerskating sceen is one of the most enjoyable of the whole movie. It also has this strange homoerotic thing going on with Walken's character and the guy he shares a cabin with.
It also has lead me to read more today about the Johnson County War, (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnson_County_War) which has been depicted in several other movies. Annie Proulx has written about it also. For those who love Brokeback I would encourage you to read all of Proulx's
Close Range stories, and read up on this insurrection, it helps to understand the world that Jack and Ennis would have lived in. For them to have a little cow and calf operation would not only have been remarkable for them being together, it would have been in keeping with their immigrant ancestors who fought a hard battle against the stock growers just to have a spot on the map to call home.
I think about my trip to Johnson County, Wyoming in 2006 and I wish I had known more about it when I was there.
[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiNlthlz1d8[/youtube]
Topic: Shakesthegrounds Rumblings (Read 2596687 times)