I watched the movie last night again for the first time in over a month, and as usual, even though I've now seen it 18 times (but who's counting?), I noticed a couple of things I hadn't before. And unlike all the other times, I had a revelation. I discovered exactly why it is I personally am drawn to this story and these characters. Like Eric has said, what you get out of this movie is what you bring to it. And part of that is one's willingness to face what one brings to it.
Others here have shared some intensely personal stuff here, and I'm about to do the same, and without trepidation because you all make me feel quite safe. So here goes: My husband and I have had some problems in our marriage with intimacy. It's not that we have no desire to be intimate with each other and it's not that we haven't been, and many times. But we haven't been as intimate with each other and on as regular a basis as I'm sure he would like or even as I would as a typical straight woman who does truly love and trust her husband but who is 41 and has had a child and works outside of the home as well. He's known since we were dating that I was molested as a child repeatedly. But he has always thought it was by a close friend of one of my older brothers. He's thought that because that's all I've told him. Until two weeks ago, when we finally had "The Talk" - the one that would determine whether we would separate or not. Yes, it had gotten that bad. Two weeks ago I told him the truth - that in fact it was one of my brothers. And it was for at least three years, when I was between the ages of 6 and 9. All this time, I had rationalized that I should never tell him because I didn't want him to hate my brother. I have a decent relationship with him now - he's even visited us, with his wife at the time, a couple of times here in Florida and he and my husband get along quite well. But I realize it was really because I was ashamed and I worried that he'd think less of me.
Of course he was floored. But instead of being hurt that I hadn't trusted him enough to tell him sooner, it released all the love he's had for me all these years but kept hidden because he feared it wasn't truly reciprocated. We talked and cried and held each other for another hour, and the next morning, it was as if we had started completely over. All the resentment he's had towards me because he felt unloved by me was gone, and he was more loving and affectionate than I even realized he was capable of being. I think we can truly move on from here and be better than we've ever been, as long as we keep talking about it and facing it together whenever the need arises.
So now I watched the movie last night, I realize, for the first time since that revelation was made. And had another one. As I watched Ennis close that closet in his trailer at the end, I literally thought "Oh, Ennis. You'll never be able to get past it." And then I realized it: I am Ennis. That's what I've brought to it every single time. That's why I want to reach into the screen and rock him in my arms when he backs away from that closet, his eyes looking like black quartz brimming with those tears. But hopefully now I'm Ennis who's getting another chance, and who isn't going to be afraid to take it.
And now I know, too, why my husband who up until that time had never really cried in front of me wept openly when Ennis found the shirts the time he watched it with me.