TOTW 12/07:Is Brokeback Mountain a 'universal love story' or a 'gay love story'?

[tampatalon]

I cannot decide which kind of love story so I just love da story 

[JT]

To me, it's a universal love story with a gay touch to it.  To be honest, I don't think there are such thing as a "gay love story" or a "straight love story".  Love is universal regardless of who loves who.  BBM is a love story period.  It just have a tragic end and the lovers just happen to be two men.

[Brown Eyes]

Yes, I agree that the love represented is a universal thing... or universally experienced regardless of gender or sexual orientation.  But, the film/story is based on what happens to universal love (love that anyone can identify with) under the specific pressures put on gay men within the specific social conditions of Wyoming and Texas during the time span of the story.  I think it is important to recognize the gay context as a really significant aspect of the story and their struggle to maintain their relationship.  Somehow saying it's simply universal seems too easy to me... I think it's more complex.

And, I'll reiterate that I think BBM examines what it means to be gay... as a complicated personal identity, as a factor in a relationship, etc... in a terrifically nuanced, throughtful and subtle way.  I think BBM does this better than most any film I've ever seen.

[Shakesthecoffecan]

I remain of the opinion it is a story about the effect of rural homophobia, but its effect is the message we nedd to love, and we need to be brave about it sometimes.

[jstephens9]

I remain of the opinion it is a story about the effect of rural homophobia, but its effect is the message we nedd to love, and we need to be brave about it sometimes.

I'm curious if you mean rural homophobia as opposed to urban homophobia which also existed, and still does exist, in the cities. I believe I posted something in the last topic of the week concerning how BBM would be looked at 30 years from now and I was mentioning how homophobia, although underground, exists in the urban areas even now. I mentioned how "gays" are not looked at in favor by a large part of the FDNY and the NYPD. I mentioned that I did not know how it was viewed by the same type of organizations in San Francisco. If anyone know this, please post it as I am curious. I'm not sure if you have seen "Forever Blue" (an episode of Cold Case) or not, but it was supposed to be about the same time as BBM, but was in Philadelphia and was about two cops who were in love.

[jstephens9]

To me, it's a universal love story with a gay touch to it.  To be honest, I don't think there are such thing as a "gay love story" or a "straight love story".  Love is universal regardless of who loves who.  BBM is a love story period.  It just have a tragic end and the lovers just happen to be two men.

I like your ideas JT. I tend to have the same feelings towards BBM.

[southendmd]

I think it was Annie herself who said the story was about destructive rural homophobia. 

I'm of the opinion that the term "universal" was bandied around to advertise the film and make it more "palatable" to folks who wouldn't otherwise want to see a gay love story.

I think Dan Mendelsohn said the difference between "Romeo and Juliet" and BBM is that Romeo and Juliet didn't hate the way they loved , like Ennis, thereby making it a distinctive gay story, and not universal at all. 

To put them together, it's about destructive, rural, internalized  homophobia.

[Brown Eyes]

I think you're right about the internalized homophobia that's so central to BBM makes this story different from a completely "universal" love story. 

Again, somehow I think to say the story is "universal" is too simplified.  There's more to it than that.

I'm now trying to think if I even really understand what's meant by the word "universal" in this type of discussion about BBM.  Clearly, it was a popular way for critics to describe the movie and they usually used it when they wanted to praise the film.

Is it somehow more threatening if it *is* a specifically gay love story?
 

What is universal love?  I would guess that lots and lots of individuals experience love in very different ways.  I wonder if people really would be able to agree on a description of what "universal" love is?
 

[malina]

Good question, and one I don't quite know the answer to. But here is my reasoning, such as it is...

First, on a personal level...

a) I'm not gay, and yet it spoke to me about love, and I certainly identified with the characters and with the love, denial of love, fear, loss, etc., so perhaps that means it was universal. Except...

b) I have a history of liking gay love stories better than straight love stories, and responding to them more strongly and getting more obsessed and finding the whole thing somehow more beautiful than if it was about a man and a woman. So perhaps that means it was a gay love story. Except...

On a more intellectual (trying to be) level...

I think, like many gay love stories, it is really about forbidden love. And that, in turn, can be and IS universal. Someone very clever explained it to me one time. Some love stories reinforce the societal standards... like Shakesperean comedies where everyone gets married in the end, or chick flicks... and some love stories, the really BIG and more powerful ones, go against the societal standards and transcend them and eventually (but usually not till after a tragedy) change them. And that's what I really think BBM is.

Short answer:

Universal.

[jstephens9]

Is it somehow more threatening if it *is* a specifically gay love story?
 

I'm curious if you or anyone else thinks that if BBM would have been marketed as a gay love story it would have had a smaller audience? Or for another question, would there have been a larger audience if it would have been marketed as a comedy? Obviously, it was definitely not a comedy, but going by the number of jokes concerning it from the media and talk show hosts some people may have had the idea it was a comical. In other words, a movie in the vein of Will and Grace with the characters acting like Jack (that is Jack from Will and Grace).