Timeline for the last scenes

[Penthesilea]

Hi,

this topic as been tangent to in the thread called "Black hats, white hats". Since it is ot over there, I opened new topic here 

I still see it as Ennis going directly from the bus station/diner to the post office to the phone booth all on the same day.  When you watched it again, Katherine, did you get this sense, too?  I can see where he'd go to Lightning Flat on a different day - he'd have to look up the Twists and arrange a visit with them beforehand after all.  But those three other things seem to take place in succession to me in the movie, anyway.

Barb, I've always assumed they happened on different days. Either of us could be right, I guess (let's check to see if the shirt under the jacket changes to find out for sure!).

I think the last scenes happen not only on different days, but they are weeks or even months apart from another. With one exception: receiving the postcard and the phone-call. I'm very sure they both happen on the same day, directly in a row. Ennis went right to the phone box after reading the card. He couldn't believe it (and didn't want to believe it) but was horrified by the feeling it is true. He needed to have certainty that it happened and needed to know what had happened. He could not have waited for days to call Lureen, no way.
I can't think of Ennis reacting otherwise but directly call Lureen as soon as he read the card.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Editing the above written:
I wanted to know it for sure and checked the screencaps at heathbaby.com

I was right. Ennis wears the same shirt when receiving the postcard and when calling Lureen. He wears a different one in the pie scene (which is shown directly before) and a different one at the Twist home scene  (which is shown directly afterwards).

So my personal view of the time-line for the last scenes is:
pie scene - a couple of weeks, maybe more (one or two months) - receiving the postcard - immediately followed by the phone call - couple of days or weeks (not a long time) - Ennis at Twists' home - some months (a longer time now, nearly one year later because it has to be before June 1984) - trailer scene with Alma Jr and "Jack, I swear".

[Aussie Chris]

So my personal view of the time-line for the last scenes is:
pie scene - a couple of weeks, maybe more (one or two months) - receiving the postcard - immediately followed by the phone call - couple of days or weeks (not a long time) - Ennis at Twists' home - some months (a longer time now, nearly one year later because it has to be before June 1984) - trailer scene with Alma Jr and "Jack, I swear".

Ooooh, this is interesting!  I confess I never thought about it, so based on this Penthesilea, I think this sounds about right.  Is there any contention about this though?  Anyone have different ideas that also make sense and can be explained?

[Ellemeno]

Here's what I think:
Pie scene: Ennis is very down and depressed.  (One poster here suggests it's the day Jack, unbeknownst to Ennis, is killed.)
Pick up the mail scene: enough time has passed that Ennis has a kind of skip in his step as he leaves the post office.  He's feeling pretty good - til he reads the postcard.
He goes straight to the phone booth across the street and calls Lureen right away.  Soon after (how soon, we don't know) he makes a date by phone or maybe postcard to go see Jack's parents.  Mrs. Twist is expecting him when she comes out the door.

[David]

The Pie scene to me is set later in the day.   Maybe supper time even.   It looks like it is geting dark out     

Ennis no doubt walked across the street to the phone booth after he got the postcard back.   We clearly see the phone booth in the background.

I think Ennis went up to the Twist Ranch as soon as possible.   I sure as hell would have.

[serious crayons]

Here's mine:

Pie: Some time after the lake argument, maybe a few weeks or a month, because Cassie has been trying for a while to get hold of Ennis. Not multiple months, because if so Cassie's conversation would be slightly different and because Ennis is so depressed, as if still dwelling on the argument. On the other hand, Jack may already be dead, based on Ennis already wearing his gray "mourning" jacket, which I realize is a pretty hypothetical basis for a definitive answer on the timeline. It could just be that Jack is already doomed, but not dead.

Postcard: Could be quite a while after the pie scene, because it must be getting a closer to their November rendezvous if he's ready to set an exact date. Maybe August or September?

Phone booth: The day of the postcard, or the next day. He wouldn't have waited long, but to me, he doesn't seem as intensely shocked or emotional as he would if he'd just finished reading the postcard. And I think it would take him a little while to get up the resolve to call Lureen. Maybe he went through a torturous night and decided that he'd call the next day. Is the phone booth the same one in both scenes?

Twist ranch: A few days or at most a week after the phone call. He wouldn't have waited around long with the fate of the ashes undetermined.

Alma Jr.: Maybe a month or two later. He's had time to move and settle into his trailer, and it looks autumnal outside. But his grief still seems pretty close to the surface. So I'd say it's that same fall, maybe getting close to the rendezvous that never happened.

[MaineWriter]

Here's my take:

Lake: May, 1983

Pie: one week after the lake scene. Ennis is still depressed. He was at the lake for a week, now home for a week--Cassie hasn't seen him for two weeks and has figured out she got dumped by hasn't gotten over it yet.

Postcard: October, 1983. He sent it in September to plan the November trip (waited until August was over since they didn't have an August get together). The way things work in the postal service, it took a few weeks for the card to get returned.

Phone call: same day as the postcard.

Twist visit: November, 1983. Took awhile for Ennis to get in touch with them, make the arrangements and find a day he could take off for work. By November, ranch operations are at a lull.

Junior visit: April 1984, about 6 weeks before the wedding

[David]

I agree Leslie.   That's how I see it too.   Besides, we know that Ennis had that time off in November anyways.   

[ednbarby]

I agree with you, too, Leslie.

So now we're left to wonder what the timeframe was for Jack after the lake.

Following the reasoning of Ennis' switch of jacket colors from brown to gray as symbolizing his subconscious mourning for Jack's literal death, I have a new theory for what happened to Jack.

It's been posited in the past that Jack gave up on ever being with Ennis openly that last day together.  I agree with that.  But does it follow that he went back to Childress and took up openly with Randall, breaking up both their marriages, instead?  Jack had 14 hours to think on his way back home.  And here's what my mind's eye pictures him deciding.  No way Randall can fill the void Ennis has left in his life.  And it's not fair to do to Randall what he's had done to him for the last 20 years, which is not equally return his love.  He knows he doesn't love Randall, or at least he doesn't enough.  So it's best to cut him loose.  When he gets back, he does just that.  A week or two goes by.  He's depressed.  He can't have Ennis the way he wants, and he's just broken up with a good catch that he realizes he just doesn't love enough.  He has a particularly shitty day at the office, a big blow-out with Lureen, and heads to the local bar.  He starts drinking shots of whiskey.  He sees a man in a white hat looking at him from across the bar.  He looks familiar...  Oh, yeah - it's that mechanic from that shop down by Roy's place.  What's he lookin' at?  I've seen him lookin' at me like that before.  Does he want me to come over?  He *is* kinda smiling...  How ya doin'?  Bill, ain't it?  Whatcha drinkin', Bill?  JD?  Good choice.  Lemme buy ya your next one, an' a chaser too.  You're the one that worked on my pickup about a month ago, ain't ya?  Been runnin' like a top ever since.  I been meanin' to thank ya...

[TJ]

I don't remember where it was posted, either here on BetterMost Forums or on some other online forum board; but, the timeline I saw based on the final screenplay for the movie seemed to have Ennis going to the Twist Place in the next year AFTER Ennis talked to Lureen on the Phone.  Because Jack's boyhood bedroom was hot on the Twist ranch at Lightning Flat (one of the reasons Ennis opened the window in the room), it could not have been in the Fall of the same year unless there had been a heat wave in NE Wyoming on the Central Plains.

(An aside here, in the AP story, the "relationship" which Ennis had with woman who worked part-time in the Wolf Ears bar in Signal was before May 1983 when the guys were together last.)

[delalluvia]

Interestingly, and messed up as usual, the screenplay says their last meeting took place in 1981, the last postcard and the trip to the Twists in 1982.