Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum
what's the point of the job switch?
Front-Ranger:
First of all, thanks, dela, for your opinion on Jack and the can opener. I agree! I've gone on and on about this in the IMDB thread "Jack was maligned unfairly."
But on to the subject at hand. I think the job switch can be viewed on several different levels. Symbolically, Aguirre (society) assigns Jack and Ennis their roles but when they are released on BBM, they let nature take its course and assume the roles that feel best to them. They are far removed from society and its judgements.
Secondly, character development. Jack is the sociable one, the one who makes a home/family, while Ennis is accustomed to being alone and enjoys riding Cigar Butt, a good night horse, on commutes to/from the sheep. So, their switch of roles suits them.
Jack takes on the housekeeping, but Lee portrays Ennis doing lots of housekeeping too. And when he shows Jack housekeeping, Jack is doing things in such an unusual way that it doesn't seem stereotyped. For example, back to the can opener scene. Jack is opening the can while lying down, balancing the can on his stomach! No wonder he gets splattered with the contents! Moremoje also pointed out one time about how Ennis and Jack were both hacking up a tree--Ennis was using a saw, while Jack was hacking away with an ax.
A third level is what I will call the mythical level where Jack and Ennis are two spirits involved in an ever-changing interplay of shifting balances which is what love is and how it evolves. There are seemingly contradictory elements which become complementary over time.
I feel like there's more to this and I've just scratched the surface, but thank you for bringing this up.
bbm_stitchbuffyfan:
Front-Ranger makes a good point here: we see them both doing 'housework.' That should be taken into account.
cmr107:
--- Quote from: bbm_stitchbuffyfan on April 29, 2006, 02:56:29 pm ---Front-Ranger makes a good point here: we see them both doing 'housework.' That should be taken into account.
--- End quote ---
Yeah, and isn't the only time we ever see Jack doing anything having to do with food preparation (in the first summer) the thing with the can opener? We see Ennis cooking and cleaning up a lot, but only the one time for Jack. (Sorry if I'm wrong, it's been a while since I've seen it.)
Front-Ranger:
Well there is the scene where Jack is peeling potatoes. You may have missed that Courtney because Ennis was stripping in the background :D. But I was very impressed with Jack's skills with a paring knife.
Jeff Wrangler:
--- Quote from: delalluvia on April 28, 2006, 11:34:03 pm ---
--- Quote ---I've always, since 1997, taken that to mean that Ennis has well-developed saddle muscles that enable him to throw a good fuck.
This is also where the narrative tells us that Jack lies to Ennis about his sexual activity with other guys: "'Shit no,' said Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own."
--- End quote ---
Do we know for sure that's what it means though?
We all have discussed this same thing on other threads I recall, but I don't think we ever got a definitive answer. As as woman, a man can ask me to 'ride him' which obviously means peg A in slot B. But a Civil War soldier spoke of going to a whorehouse and 'riding a Dutch gal', meaning of course the same thing, but HE was doing the 'riding'. So it seems the expression can be used either way.
--- End quote ---
Based on the text, we can be reasonably certain.
First time up, Ennis fucks Jack. That's clear from Annie Proulx's description of their first sexual encounter.
I won't dispute that the description could be used either way, but do bear in mind we're not talking about heterosexual sex here. Jack "rides" bulls. The implication here--to a gay man reading it--is that Jack's the one getting fucked, and there is nothing in Annie Proulx's text to indicate this changes. The analogy is Jack sitting down on a bull to ride it compared to Jack "sitting down" on Ennis's cock. Possibly the position used might change, but the understanding of this gay man--and of all the other gay men in my social circle--is that the one who is getting fucked is the one who is getting a cock inserted in his ass, regardless of whether he is being taken from behind--as in the first tent scene--or whether he might be straddling his partner and sitting down on his partner's erection.
Some gay men do switch roles. Every indication that we have of Ennis's character, in particular in the movie where internalized homophobia is such an important part of Ennis's make-up, suggests that he is not one of those gay men who switch roles. For Ennis, especially "Movie Ennis," to take Jack's cock up his own ass would have made him "queer." It just didn't happen.
Any other gay men care to "ride" this one?
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