Our BetterMost Community > Chez Tremblay
After watching my DVD a half Dozen times
Jeff Wrangler:
I don't see why you feel the need to run for cover. This part, at least, I think certainly shows how BBM fits the definition of a tragedy:
Tragedies are plays that have a common theme: humans dearing to defy the gods, fate, or societal order, and being punished for that, by paying with their own lives or losing those dearest to them. The punishment is usually administered in a symbolic or very dramatic fashion - suicide, violent death, etc.
Ennis and Jack defied their societal order. Jack lost his life, Ennis lost the one dearest to him (Jack). Jack's death is violent.
monimm18:
Thanks, Jeff :)
I forgot to mention another way punishment is administered in a classical tragedy: death by murder - execution style; which is what I consider Jack's death to be.
This is how I se it:
Ennis defied Fate - he was given Jack as his true soulmate and he refused to accept him. For that, Fate took her gift back.
Jack defied societal norms, indeed. He failed to fully hide his true nature, which was so utterly unacceptable, that "society" punished him in the cruelest way.
delalluvia:
--- Quote from: Jeff Wrangler on April 06, 2006, 09:41:13 pm ---I don't see why you feel the need to run for cover. This part, at least, I think certainly shows how BBM fits the definition of a tragedy:
Tragedies are plays that have a common theme: humans dearing to defy the gods, fate, or societal order, and being punished for that, by paying with their own lives or losing those dearest to them. The punishment is usually administered in a symbolic or very dramatic fashion - suicide, violent death, etc.
Ennis and Jack defied their societal order. Jack lost his life, Ennis lost the one dearest to him (Jack). Jack's death is violent.
--- End quote ---
Except for the 'it's a play' part. ;D Yep BBM is a tragedy, no one is disputing that. Mundane death - which was violent - or murder which was also violent.
ednbarby:
Yes, but, but...
Crap. Here's what it comes down to for me: Argonautica and Brokeback Mountain are both tragic in the irony of their conclusions. The irony in the former is that Jason was killed by the very thing that he so loved. The irony in Brokeback Mountain is that Jack was killed by the very thing that he so loved - that thing being Ennis. Ennis' refusal to build a life around Jack is what killed him. One way or another, it did. Whether that way was by accident or by murder is immaterial. Holy Hell - I'm just having this revelation now as I type... I still think the film aims to lean towards its not being an accident - that just follows the whole arc of the story - Ennis' admission to Jack that his father essentially took part in a hate crime and Jack's realization that that moment shapes who Ennis is - then Jack dies by hate crime. But I do *finally* see that either way, the level of tragedy is the same.
Wow. Annie Proulx and Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry and Ang Lee are even bigger mental giants than I had already given them credit for. Wow.
montferrat:
I'm in the " it's ambiguous " camp.
And as someone upthread mentioned, I don't think it lessens the tragedy of Ennis' life if Jack did die randomly.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version