Not surprisingly I'm sure, I have to disagree with you there, Katherine, because "the final product" did not spring, Athena-like, from Ang Lee's head. It was the result of an organic process that began with Annie Proulx's story. To me, Brokeback Mountain is a single and unique phenomenon comprising both story and film, and while they have their differences, for me nothing is irrelevant as data for analysis.
My post above refers to a line you quoted from a
previous draft of the screenplay. As I'm sure you as a writer can understand, I as a writer would not want someone, in disputing some point in a published piece of mine, say, "But look -- regardless of what she said in her 16th draft, she said blah blah blah in her third draft, so that's what she must
really mean." The whole reason for having more than one draft is that the writer's intention changes as the work develops. It must be disconcerting, to say the least, to be held to a vision that has long since been discarded.
To further complicate matters, in this case we're talking not about a single artist but three "groups" of artists: 1) Annie, 2) Larry and Diana, 3) Ang and everyone else involved in the movie. There's
at least three different visions, more if people within groups held their own views (as they no doubt did). My point is, the
screenplay is not the ultimate guide to the
movie's intentions. It's only a guide to the
screenwriters' intentions. Another layer of artists subsequently added their own. Their objectives may have been in accord -- or not. So you can't always determine what the movie meant by reading the screenplay (let alone a previous draft!).
My preferred approach is to judge the story by the final version of the story (not by any one of Annie's 60-some earlier drafts), the screenplay by the final screenplay, the movie by the edited movie. Yes, other versions can be interesting, even enlightening, but are not ultimately authoritative.
At the time that "dozy embrace" took place, Ennis couldn't face up to embracing Jack face to face. OK. But don't forget that by the time of the Story Reunion, Ennis had been wringing it out for three or four years while thinking of Jack, and had figured out that the cause of his gut cramps was that he shouldn't have let Jack out of his sights. The flashback is relevant to the story, just not to the story version of the reunion, I believe. By the time of the Story Reunion, Ennis was perfectly capable and willing to embrace Jack face to face--and I apologize if I misunderstood what you meant by the flashback not applying to the story.
We debated this once before, Jeff, when you presented your idea about Ennis maturing and learning to embrace Jack face to face. I can buy that, I guess. The trouble is, people keep insisting on applying it to Ennis throughout his life -- reunion, schmeunion. Worse, they constantly apply it to Movie Ennis, to whom it demonstrably does not apply by the time of their
second night together. As I said then, and have become even more convinced since, it was a
mistake in the story. Even if Annie meant to suggest that Ennis had matured -- and, ahem, Occam's Razor might apply here -- she did not make it clear enough (as you yourself suggested in the previous discussion!). Sorry, folks, brilliant though she may be, Annie is fallable.
by the way, when did "TS2" become "SNIT" [eeew]?).
Finally, something we can agree on!
I'll confess I think I was the originator of TS1 and TS2 (or at least, when I first used the terms I hadn't seen them used before). But SNIT and FNIT developed simultaneously on, I think, imdb, and since they spread here I have sensed a tipping point of people succumbing to those terms, and finally today I began to cave myself. But if you're willing to stick with TS1 and TS2, Jeff, I'm with you.