What is it about Gyllenhaal?

[ProwlAmongUs]

I agree with you; I don't know exactly what it is, but Gyllenhaal has a quality that attracts, and it's not merely his looks. He's vulnerable, yet masculine; tough yet compassionate, aloof at times, but caring. When he's on screen, it seems like he's an old friend ---  or the sort of guy who'd stop to talk to you in grocery lines or in the waiting room at a doctor's office. I felt this when I saw "October Sky," which was my first "encounter" with him, and he's matured so much since then his attractive qualities are amplified. I recently saw him in "Proof" and felt the same way, even though he played a character that's much different from Jack. 

[ghent]

Am I alone with this pre-occupation with Gyllenhaal?

I completely agree with you. I can't stop thinking about Jake either, and here's the reason why.

Today's Quiz - What do the following actors have in common?

Chris Meloni
Gale Harold
Javier Bardem
Billy Campbell
Fabrizio Fillippo
Jake Gyllenhaal
Johnny Depp
Rupert Graves
Gael Garcia Bernal
Russell Crowe

Oh, and I also believe that Jake 'walked away' with BBM. The 'Jack Twist' created by Jake far surpassed the character envisioned by Annie Proulx, an uncomfortable fact that even Proulx has acknowledged in interviews. Heath was Ennis, but Jake was ... something else.

[Rayn]

Jake Gyllenhaal is absolutely fricken GOREGOUS, for starters, and then also he's one of the most convincing, skilled and intelligent actors to burst on the scene lately.

Yes, I love Keith Ledger too.  They are both GOREGOUS.... But I admit, I have a weakness for Jake, and Jake as Jack Twist is just the kinda guy (slighly older though) I dream of meeting and dating one day... (soon?)  I dream with millions of other dreamers!  That's part of the fun of Hollywood.

Does that answers the question?  Do I get a prize?   (LOL)

Rayn

[starboardlight]

Am I alone with this pre-occupation with Gyllenhaal?

I completely agree with you. I can't stop thinking about Jake either, and here's the reason why.

Today's Quiz - What do the following actors have in common?

Chris Meloni
Gale Harold
Javier Bardem
Billy Campbell
Fabrizio Fillippo
Jake Gyllenhaal
Johnny Depp
Rupert Graves
Gael Garcia Bernal
Russell Crowe

Oh, and I also believe that Jake 'walked away' with BBM. The 'Jack Twist' created by Jake far surpassed the character envisioned by Annie Proulx, an uncomfortable fact that even Proulx has acknowledged in interviews. Heath was Ennis, but Jake was ... something else.

they've all played gay characters.

back to Jake. I agree, there is something intangible about him. As far as looks, yes he's hot, but so are a lot of actors and celebrities. The last time I had a crush on someone I haven't met, was in high school. For me it became futile to obsess about someone I won't meet, when there are just as many good looking, great, accessible guys that I do meet. But something about Jake just blind sided me. I was fortunate enough to go the the Q&A at the Aero and was a few feet away from the man. He just glows. Even though he was obviously tired and a little sick (coughing alot), he still exuded an energy that not many people show.

[ghent]

they've all played gay characters.

Actually, if that were sole criteria, the list would have been much  longer. 

These performers have two things in common :

1) each actor portrayed a gay man with complete emotional *and* physical credibility
2) each actor is 'arguably' straight in their public lives. Privately, I don't think there's a Kinsey 1 (completely straight) among them. Regardless of how they live their lives, I think that they're all somewhere between Kinsey 2 and Kinsey 5 emotionally and sexually.

Films in question :

Rupert Graves (Maurice)
Chris Meloni (Oz)
Billy Campbell (Tales of the City)
Jake Gyllenhaal (Brokeback Mountain)
Javier Bardem (Before Night Falls, Second Skin)
Russell Crowe (The Sum of Us)
Johnny Depp (Before Night Falls)
Phillip Seymour Hoffman (Flawless, Capote)
Gael Garcia Bernal (Bad Education)
Fabrizio Fillippo (Queer As Folk)
Gale Harold (Queer as Folk)
Peter Saarsgard (The Dying Gaul)

[starboardlight]

2) each actor is 'arguably' straight in their public lives. Privately, I don't think there's a Kinsey 1 (completely straight) among them. Regardless of how they live their lives, I think that they're all somewhere between Kinsey 2 and Kinsey 5 emotionally and sexually.

true. but then again, doesn't Kinsey say that no one is truely 1's and 6's?

[TJ]

2) each actor is 'arguably' straight in their public lives. Privately, I don't think there's a Kinsey 1 (completely straight) among them. Regardless of how they live their lives, I think that they're all somewhere between Kinsey 2 and Kinsey 5 emotionally and sexually.

true. but then again, doesn't Kinsey say that no one is truely 1's and 6's?

"Kinsey" can say whatever he wanted to say when he was alive. His findings were not exactly as scientific as one says.

The Kinsey thing is a straight line continuum from 1 to 6;  but, I see it as a bell curve with the majority of folks being bisexual.

From what I personally know about myself and my sexual orientation, I am exclusively homosexual in my sexual orientation. I have never experienced a physiological sexual attraction to a member of the opposite sex. But, I did confuse psychological, emotional, social and spiritual attractions to girls and women with sexual attraction toward them, although there was no below the belt emotion felt in their presence.

While I had seen Jack Gyllenhaal in a few movies before Brokeback Mountain, up to seeing the movie, he was just another actor to me.

Jake Gyllenhaal seems to express some natural innocence when he is on a talk show; and I also got that feeling when he was in the role of Jack Twist. So, IMO, personality wise, he was natural for the role because it was like he could "act naturally" as Jack.

[starboardlight]

The Kinsey thing is a straight line continuum from 1 to 6;  but, I see it as a bell curve with the majority of folks being bisexual.

I don't think that those two are mutually exclusive. A bell curve sits on a graph with x and y axis. Kinsey's 1-6 is just the x axis of that graph. The fact that in his theory 1's and 6's are very rare, if they exist at all would support the bell curve.

While I had seen Jack Gyllenhaal in a few movies before Brokeback Mountain, up to seeing the movie, he was just another actor to me.

Jake Gyllenhaal seems to express some natural innocence when he is on a talk show; and I also got that feeling when he was in the role of Jack Twist. So, IMO, personality wise, he was natural for the role because it was like he could "act naturally" as Jack.

I thought the same thing about Jake, until I experienced this movie. His performance here while it appears naturalistic at first, you realized how much thought he actually gave to the character when you take note of the nuances. His expressions in the moments where he wasn't saying anything, the moments that aren't described in the short story nor the script. He had to really dig deep to define the character for himself and bring out the subtle emotions. I'm a convert when I comes to Jake. I didn't think he was anything other than a pretty face until this film came along.

[ghent]

He had to really dig deep to define the character for himself and bring out the subtle emotions. I'm a convert when I comes to Jake. I didn't think he was anything other than a pretty face until this film came along.

I completely agree. I didn't really take him seriously until BBM. He gave a workmanlike performance in Proof and The Day After Tomorrow. Jarhead was also interesting and courageous, if somewhat predictable. But his performance in BBM was brilliant, especially from my post-Stonewall perspective. People have described him as Generation X's answer to Montgomery Clift and Johnny Depp, but the Meloni influence is extremely important as well. Jake is more masculine, and even macho, in BBM than Depp and Clift have ever been, and I think that this is an aspect of gay culture that red-state America needs to see. Macho Chris Keller on Oz (Meloni) is not a mainstream character, but Jack Twist circa 2006 is your next-door neighbor: your stock-broker, your lawyer, your doctor (see husky Javier Bardem in Second Skin), your farmer, your construction worker, your football player or your soccer-Dad. As long as they're completely gorgeous, of course!

Jake, on the other hand, is an honorary bearcub. 

[ednbarby]

I agree, ghent.  And excellent analogy with Christopher Meloni (who I adored on Oz and pretty much everything else he's done).  I see that comparison much more readily than the Clift or Depp ones.  Along the same lines, Heath keeps getting compared with Marlon Brando, James Dean, and Sean Penn.  I don't see that at all.  If we must make comparisons, I see William Holden - someone much more complex than those other three put together.  But really, I think they're both unlike anyone who's ever been a cinematic icon before.  I remember Owen Gliebermann was one of those who compared Jake to Montgomery Clift - I didn't see that so much, but I liked the way he preceded that by saying "he has a quicksilver quality" - as Ang Lee would say, I like the taste of that word, quicksilver, in relation to him.