Author Topic: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?  (Read 9234 times)

Offline opinionista

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #20 on: April 27, 2006, 05:39:22 am »
I think Ennis would have refused any help from Jack financially.   Too much pride.   

As far as bettering himself and his family,  heck, he wouldn't even consider getting a better job, ie: at the power plant, when Alma suggested it.    Perhpas he was embarrassed that he didn't have a High School diploma?

Ennis doesn't get the job at the power plant becuase of Jack. If He had a 9 to 5 job, he wouldn't have been able to take a week off to go "fishing" with Jack.
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #21 on: April 27, 2006, 09:06:50 am »
There's a thoughtlessness to Jack around money, the way he complains about what's the point of making it, and Lureen searching for extra zeros.  Ennis doesn't seem envious or bitter, he just says it sounds like some high class entertainment, meaning a high quality problem.

All excellent points, Elle. I also was thinking about the first of the scenes you refer to above. It IS a bit tactless to complain about the frustrations of paying capital gains tax, or whatever it was, to someone who lives in a delapidated shack.

And this

Just thought of something else I want to add - I think Ennis really is stating his credo when he tells Junior, when you don't got nothin you don't need nothin.  So partly he is truly an ascetic, but partly it's just emotionally safer to not want.

is an interesting idea. I had interpreted the statement as covering both his indifference to material things and his grief over Jack -- who cares about furniture when you don't have the love of your life. But as a credo, it applies to just about everything from beans on out. Ennis does find it emotionally safer to not want, and loving Jack was really the only exception he made.

It's amazing how many small, random, seemingly offhand lines in the movie contain such volumes of meaning.





Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #22 on: April 27, 2006, 09:13:46 am »
And in later years Jack is always warmly dressed in vests and thick parka, and Ennis is in a canvas jacket.  Brr.  Actually even up on the mountain young Jack had that warm jacket and Ennis was in canvas. 

That canvas jacket, though, is just the film being true to Annie Proulx. She created the character as someone who, summer and winter, "steps around" in worn boots, old jeans, and frayed shirts, and just adds the canvas coat in cold weather. Heck, in the original, the man doesn't even wear socks with his boots! (Ouch. ...)
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #23 on: April 27, 2006, 12:46:20 pm »
I wonder if that's also, somehow, the reason for Ennis saying "It's because of you I'm like this" to Jack at their last meeting? If Ennis was really saying "it's because of you that I need love; if I had never met you, I wouldn't care about it"? (That is: that Ennis isn't saying that Jack's the reason Ennis is gay, or that Jack's the reason that Ennis is poor. But Jack is the reason that Ennis wants... well, love, though Ennis wouldn't put it like that.)

YES!! Naky, that's approximately how I've always interpreted that line. And combining it with Elle's "don't need nothin" insight makes perfect sense. (In fact, it never occurred to me before now that someone MIGHT think he's saying "because of you I'm gay." I've never thought that, and still don't.) He may think he's saying "because of you I'm poor and unsuccessful." But what he really means is, "because of you I'm lonely and heartbroken and unhappy," not because of anything Jack did, but because he wants to be with Jack and can't, and if Jack weren't there he wouldn't have to feel bad. Implicitly, it's his response to "Sometimes I miss you so much I can hardly stand it." Not as sweet, of course, but in character.




Offline Kd5000

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #24 on: April 27, 2006, 03:47:10 pm »
his life where he felt in control and sure of himself and, on a limited scale, successful.

Regarding some of the higher up posts...

Well yes, would Ennis have freaked out if Jack had offered him money, "now we are acting like husband and wife or something," just thinking outloud of how Ennis would have responded.  THere are alot of boundaries on this relationship... Ennis is self-reliant. Don't want no help.   

Ennis enjoyed his work he did at a ranch hand.  HOwever, his options as he gets owner to seek employment elsewhere seem to have closed. Towards the end of the film, he can't quit those jobs like he used to, hence the blowup about not being able to take time off at August and Jack would had to return in November. 

Afterall, you do get vacation time working at a powerplant.  Maybe 4 weeks leave after 20 years and you'd sure be more comfortable.   It's not like Jack was coming to visit Ennis more then two or three times a year.  Well, that's the impression I got.  Certainly a trip up to WY five or six times a year would have made Lureen suspicous or even worse, my husband is a bad employee, can't be around for the big sales on the farm equipment.

Offline delalluvia

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Re: Jack and Ennis: ECONOMIC DIVIDE, HELPING HAND?
« Reply #25 on: April 27, 2006, 08:20:28 pm »
Afterall, you do get vacation time working at a powerplant.  Maybe 4 weeks leave after 20 years and you'd sure be more comfortable.  It's not like Jack was coming to visit Ennis more then two or three times a year.  Well, that's the impression I got.  Certainly a trip up to WY five or six times a year would have made Lureen suspicous or even worse, my husband is a bad employee, can't be around for the big sales on the farm equipment.

You DO??!?!?   :o  Jeez, where I work, there are people who've been with the company 15 years and they STILL only get 2 weeks vacation a year!