Proulx "these characters began to get very damn real"

[optom3]

When I was re reading,yet again Proulxs' essay Getting movied.Those words leapt off the page at me. If the characters wre becomming so real to her,something she says had never happened to her before,what chance did we the viewer stand.We were witnessing the whole thing unfold not just in words,but in superlative acting and wide screen technicolour.

Many of us have wondered why we became so involved in the film.Is this the answer.She also intersetingly implies the characters were disobedient.She says they were unlike her other characters "who do what they are told".
She finishes that section by saying "Jack and Ennis soon seemed more vivid than many of the flesh and blood people around me"

Is that not something that has happened for many of us? Jack and Ennis became real,we lived their pain,we truly felt it, and so were deeply impacted by the film beyond anything we had experienced before.
Just as Proulx writing the story experienced a first in terms of her characters becomming real,so was it not for many of us a first.

It almost appears to me at least that both writer and viewer experienced something akin to an epiphany.It may be argued that the same was also true for Heath and Jake,tackling probably the roles of their lives.They too,particularly I feel Heath,became the characters.
It all became real for all of us.Hence the immense sensation of desolation and loss.

I would as always, appreciate others thoughts on the matter.

[Artiste]

Optom, you sure bring up a great subject!

I totally agree with you!

I think that Annie feels for gay men, finds that society isolates them and that, therefore, gay men isloated themselves (and still do to certain degrees), in order to save their lives. Lives are REAL therefore for her... and for US too!!

She also adds much more?

Awaiting your news and will read them after going into the snow to shop for mother who has a cold,

take care,

au revoir,
hugs!

[Shakesthecoffecan]

You know how we have all felt, and wrote about here. Can you imagine what it was like, for months on end, having Jack and Ennis in your head and you were all alone in the world with them? That would have been quite a load to carry.

[Mandy21]

By the same token, what about Susan and Larry, the screenwriters?  Taking a 53-page book and having to crawl inside not only Jack's and Ennis's (and all the other character's) minds, hearts, and souls, but into Annie's as well?  And turning that into 2 hours and 14 minutes of heaven for all of us?  I'm sure their task was no less daunting, and no less real and traumatic, than Annie's.

[myprivatejack]

IMO,we feel so identified with the characters because they're so real; and they're so real because there's no point of heroicism in them.On one hand,they needed to be a kind of heroes to deffend their love and the life's style that this meant, if they'd arrived to share this "sweet life" in such a difficult social and religious environment.But thier heroicism comes from the normality,not from any extraordinary situation or behaviour.And on the other hand,as I said in another topic,they're just like all of us,with their-and our-faults,mistakes,doubts,and even this unavoidable hurt to third persons-like Alma's case,f.e.-.They're  not like the romantic prince of a Fair's tale;THEY´RE REAL,AUTHENTICAL,AND HUMAN.
And they're so in a context of dignification of homosexuality roles,far from the cliches that almost always have introduced them as a "queer", a neurotic or,OMG¡ a pshyco killer...They're two persons who love and are loved in a way that most of the current love stories don't show.I think it's easy to get identified with them no matter our sexual tendencies or gender,because they love as any of us would be loved and love,or as some of us have loved and be loved in any time of our lives.Simply this.

[optom3]

You know how we have all felt, and wrote about here. Can you imagine what it was like, for months on end, having Jack and Ennis in your head and you were all alone in the world with them? That would have been quite a load to carry.

I cannot begin to imagine. A very valid point.
In the "getting movied" she points out that it took weeks just to get one phrase right!!!
Intersestingly my favourite scene in movie and s.s, the dozy embrace is the one she says was the most difficult to write.
All I can say Is I salute Proulx,Ang,Ossana,McMurty,Heath,Jake et al.You all got it sooo right!!!

The ones who got it sooo wrong were the Academy.They were cowards, compared to the courage displayed by all in the film and s.s. A bit like the contrasts in the film itself.I wonder if "they" get the irony there? Let me think about that for a nano second.NO.

I think Proulx herself sums it up completely when she writes "I was not prepared for the emotional hammering I got when I saw it"
'seeing the film disturbed me"
'my story was not mangled but enlarged into huge and gripping imagery that rattled minds and squeezed hearts" (Too right,it certainly squeezed my heart.)

I guess that is why she is such an amazing writer,and I am not.She can sum it all up perfectly and succinctly !!!!!

[Artiste]

Funny how they get more real for me, everyday?

Why is that?

Or should I say how is that?

News from you and from all awaited,

au revoir,
hugs!

[optom3]

Funny how they get more real for me, everyday?

Why is that?

Or should I say how is that?

News from you and from all awaited,

au revoir,
hugs!

It is odd ,I  keep thinking the effect will lessen,but instead it gets worse each day.
Also each day it becomes more and more hard to believe that Heath has gone. It should get easier.I am almost beginning to feel bewitched.Normally I am a reasonably sane person.
When it comes to BBM I seem to have lost all reason.

[winterhug]

Optom, you have started a great topic! I'll add some ramblings:

I thought I was long over the effects of Jack and Ennis and had actually reduced my obsessive preoccupation with them… well, at least somewhat… but the more I continue to read, the more their rampant recurrences as very real people come into my brain!. Like you, I read Annie Proulx's essay "Getting Movied!” If the author was so convinced of the reality of these characters then certainly I can understand why a reader/viewer like me would come to know them as real too. I agree with your analysis of “what chance did we have?” So in a sense I am relieved because there is more going on here than just my dumb-ass obsession.

Some authors say they don't feel like they are in control of their work, rather they become channels for stories, characters, situations that need to come out and so they learn to let it flow through them without hindrance. In this sense, characters do take on a life of their own and become real. Personally after my limited BBM exposures (and I do consider myself sane most of the time) I now feel the presence of what I call an Ennis Spirit, which is a very loving, eager, inviting and welcoming spirit, so pleasant to feel. No, it's not an imaginary friend and there is no embodiment, but it is real and present to me post-BBM.

Here's another thought: Now that Heath's spirit has been set free of his body (all the worse for us, but possibly all the better for him!) I want to believe his spirit is a part of this greater spirit or field of energy that all of us apparently sense… otherwise why would we be here? I don't know what happens after death-I'm reading Deepak Chopra's book "Life After Death" to get some clues. Of course no one ever came back to prove these things. Chopra thinks the Christian conceptions of heaven are similar to eternal assisted living! I hate to admit it, but he's got a point. He believes there are levels of existence present right here but we don't focus ourselves to tune into them. One of the ways we can get a hint of these other planes of reality is to pay attention to the subtle things around us. What are those? Perhaps one subtle force for me is this Ennis Spirit I'm experiencing. For me, spirit & spirituality is definitely real, so the thought of Ennis and/or Heath's spirit being real and present in our midst is not a tough sell. Like Annie Proulx says after she lists all the details that gave the film authenticity and authority for her (one of them being a speckled enamel coffeepot), “People may doubt that young men fall in love up on the snowy heights, but no one disbelieves the speckled coffeepot, and if the coffeepot is true, so is the other.”

You are so correct in saying that Heath BECAME Ennis—there is no way anyone could give us Ennis like he did without BEING him! I think Ennis’ “creator” agrees as she talks about Heath Ledger in “Getting Movied:”
“…the cast and crew of this film, from the director down, had gotten into my mind and pulled out images. Especially did I feel this about Heath Ledger, who knew better than I how Ennis felt and thought, whose intimate depiction of the achingly needy ranch kid builds with frightening power. It is an eerie sensation to see events you have imagined in the privacy of your mind, and tried hopelessly to transmit to others through little black marks on a page, loom up before you in an overwhelming visual experience.”

How rich this story!!!

[optom3]

I firmly believe that if you are truly open you will see.I know that sounds cryptic.I have experienced some very odd things in my life.Yet if questioned would strongly deny being religious per se.However I have both seen and felt things that I cannot scientifically explain away.That annoys the cynic in me.
I do think that I am very open and susceptible to things though.And so for me Ennis and Jack became very real.In a way I have not experienced before.
I truly think this was because I watched the film at a time when I was doing some serious and honest self evaluation.
So I was very open.Almost raw.This has been both painful but also very illuminating and in many ways has freed me.
To others it was just a film,maybe because they were at the time watching with closed eyes.As in there are none so blind as those who will not see,or allow themselves to see.
Perhaps some people are unable to cope emotionally,with the journey you have to take,to truly understand and reveal yourself.I found it incredibly painful,but there are rewards in self awareness,for those who are willing to take the plunge.