Author Topic: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"  (Read 11038 times)

Offline chowhound

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Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« on: April 10, 2011, 03:22:24 pm »
In an interview with Michelle Williams in the April 3 issue of The Sunday Times (London), the writer has this to say about Brokeback Mountain:

"Her insistence on eye contact also gives the lie to the idea that she's a shrinking violet. And it's precisely this ability to suggest the delicate and the robust that lies at the heart of her finest work. Think of Brokeback Mountain where her mutely panicked reaction shot on witnessing her husband's infidelity with another man provided that movie with its heftiest emotional wallop."

It's a fine moment but for me it's not the scene with "the heftiest emotional wallop". If I can only pick one, I think it would be the reunion kiss, in part because we don't know how the reunion will go. We share with Heath his anxiety as he waits for Jack and we share with him his joy once he sees that Jack has actually arrived. From the point where he says "Jack f...ing Twist" to where he sweeps Jack up in his arms for the reunion kiss itself  provides for me the "movie's heftiest emotional wallop" but others may wish to lay claim to a different scene.
« Last Edit: April 10, 2011, 05:57:57 pm by chowhound »

Offline Front-Ranger

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #1 on: April 10, 2011, 05:39:39 pm »
The reunion kiss is definitely a heart-stopping moment, but for me the big wallop came when Ennis found the shirts and saw the blood stained sleeves folded into each other. As he crouched in the closet and embraced the shirts, all the memories of Jack and the years they could have had came flooding back. Pressing the cold iron hanger to his face where it made the indentation of a question mark into his cheek. His hands came together in a prayerful position surrounding the shirts, and the steel guitar gave a mournful lament.
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Offline serious crayons

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #2 on: April 10, 2011, 06:09:06 pm »
Yeah, that's a strange line in the article. It was a hefty emotional wallop, sure, but the movie's heftiEST? Not by a long shot. Especially since the wallop, as this writer sees it, seems to come mostly from the emotions that Alma's experiencing in that scene.

Um, it's fine to be sympathetic to the wronged wife -- understandable, even. But Alma's plight is not exactly the focus of the story, nor is she the character the one who endures the most or sharpest pain.


Offline southendmd

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #3 on: April 10, 2011, 06:17:54 pm »
It's Alma's heftiest emotional wallop, but not the film's. 

For me, it's the totality of the Lake Scene, and how it segues into the Dozy Embrace.  Now THAT's a wallop.  Works for me every time, both on paper and on film.

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #4 on: April 10, 2011, 06:37:39 pm »
It's Alma's heftiest emotional wallop, but not the film's. 

Good take on it, Paul. For Alma that experience must have felt like a kick in the stomach.
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Offline Katie77

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #5 on: April 10, 2011, 07:15:19 pm »

I guess it depends on who is watching the film, and their own circumstances, when it comes to feeling the pain of the characters, or who "endures the most or the sharpest pain"

I can still remember seeing BBM for the first time, having not read the story, and was so elated with the reunion scene, that it turned out the way we were all hoping it would, and THEN Alma looked out the door, and the change in emotions I was feeling, from happiness and elation to a gut wrenching OH NOOOOOOOO....well it nearly made me throw up. It was completely unexpected, and sent my thoughts into a tailspin. Such an abrupt end to the euphoria of the reunion scene. We had got so caught up with the excitement for the boys, that we never gave Alma a thought, and then there she was, in a way, spoiling it for us, like the third wheel, we didnt want her there, but she was there.

I think Alma was feeling just like we were, the build up of the day, seeing how excited and restless Ennis was, seeing the joy and excitement when Jack arrived, she wanted to be part of that excitement and then competely unexpected that joy turned to  bewilderment and devastation.

Alma was the innocent party in this threesome, she did nothing to promote it, and could do nothing to prevent it. And in that torment in her life, she also had the two girls to care for.

Everyone in this movie went through their own devastating pain.
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Offline Penthesilea

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #6 on: April 11, 2011, 12:51:22 am »
It was completely unexpected, and sent my thoughts into a tailspin. Such an abrupt end to the euphoria of the reunion scene. We had got so caught up with the excitement for the boys, that we never gave Alma a thought, and then there she was, in a way, spoiling it for us, like the third wheel, we didnt want her there, but she was there.


That's a good way to put it, she really kind of spoiled the reunion scene for us. I remember youtube videos with Alma being edited out.



But the biggest emotional wallop? For me it was the deceased postcard. I literally gasped and thought Nooo! That was really like being hit in the stomach. It was a complete shock. Consequently, my reaction was denial. On my first viewing I waited for a Hollywood-like miracle for the rest of the movie.

Later, with repeated viewings, things shifted a bit. I could (and to this day can) hardly stand the lake scene and flashback. Gets me every time.

Offline Monika

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #7 on: April 11, 2011, 03:06:48 am »
It's Alma's heftiest emotional wallop, but not the film's. 

Absolutely. The reunion kiss is Alma´s lowest point and Jack´s and Ennis´s highest point all at once.


And for me too, the movie´s "heftiest emotional wallop" is the way the lake scene leads to the Dozy Embrace and then back again to Jack as he watches Ennis drive away (and being the last time we see Jack alive). It shows us how things could have been only to take it away from us.

Offline Shakesthecoffecan

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #8 on: April 14, 2011, 11:02:24 pm »
The Dozy Embrace was in one way a wallop, because it transports back to those hylcion days when they owned the world, and provided a sharp counterpoint to all that has followed.

But the hardest wallop is finding the shirts. Especially finding his shirt hidden in Jack's, I saw that and I remembered them coming down from the mountain and he was wearing a different one, one not seen before. Jack had kept it all that time. It was real. That was how it hit me.
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Offline Mandy21

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Re: Brokeback Mountain's "heftiest emotional moment"
« Reply #9 on: April 15, 2011, 12:41:16 pm »
For me, it was the tiny little flinch that Ennis gives when he listens to Jack's dad tell him about how Jack had changed his story from Ennis Del Mar coming out to help on the ranch, to the new guy Jack had said was going to come out and help.

That almost-imperceptible flinch reminded me of every breakup in my life.  Struck my heart to the core, thinking of the pain I'd caused and the pain I'd endured.
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