Wherein I Become a Seething Pile of Emotion

I was going to go back and update that damn mile long list of movies that I saw in 2005 to include the last few days of the year, which were a flurry of cinema (my final tally was 56 movies, up from 53), as there was not much else to do during the break.

I'm not, though, because I realized that I would have a new #1 movie, which would necessitate changing every single number in the post, which is just not on.

So Brokeback Mountain gets a whole (ginormous) entry to itself.

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Okay first off, the movie itself is excellent. It's beautifully shot and paced. The intro is a bit long, but right. They expanded on the short story perfectly, adding some things that I really dug (Ennis's relationship with his daughter is a good example) without dragging the movie out. The acting is freaking ridiculous - Michelle Williams's performance makes up for every single bad movie ever made by a member of Dawson's Creek, up to and including Varsity Blues, which is saying possibly too much. Heath Ledger (from a goddamn Knight's Tale all jousting to Queen) made me cry. The ending was so completely perfect that it broke me. Each and every one of Anne Hathaway's wigs deserved an acting nomination for how perfectly Texas each one was. I cannot come up with enough good things to say about this movie.

I only have two annoyances. 1) Some of the later scenes were either shot in horrible light or the makeup was completely off, because Jake Gyllenhall looked like his face was melting off. I get that they were trying to age him, but come on people. If I can see the foundation, you know something is off. 2) I love that scene late in the movie where Michelle Williams confronts Heath Ledger about all his fishing trips and her little ploy to prove that he never actually fished (one of the best scenes and almost verbatim from the short story). But in the movie she has seen him and Jake hardcore making out in front of their house. I'm thinking that's a little better evidence than your clever ruse involving fishing lures, watching two guys trying to consume each other's faces on the front yard. But maybe that's just me. As Frank said "Maybe they were just really happy to see their good buddy." Because you know that's how I greet my old cowboy friends.

Anyways, I've gone on way too much about the faults.

There is something more about the story that gets to me, a way that some of the scenes were done that just lodges right inside me. I've already gushed at length about the movie itself, but I'm talking about how they work up the relationship between Jack and Ennis, heck how they show them individually too.

It's a matter that I claim some expertise in - growing up gay (in the South) with the religious stuff drilled in to your DNA that it's all a sin. To say that I feel where Jack and Ennis are coming from is an internet understatement of massive proportions. Ennis particularly - quiet, reserved, focused on the job, morally conflicted, etc.

But it's not even the same thing. When you add in the time period that they're in, it's magnified a million times - I don't deal with 1% of the stigma they're talking about in the 60's. The whole thing is almost too much for me to wrap my head around.

I'm rambling, so we'll cut to the scenes I want to talk about:

• Ennis's nervous waiting when Jack comes to meet him for the first time. Drinking beers, staring out the window all day with that jumpy anticipation. That whole - 'Jack's not that kind of guy, probably just go out to a bar' thing. The whole build up telegraphs his feelings so well that I could feel myself physically tightening up in response. And then the payoff when they actually meet on the steps - when I say the movie broke me, seriously. That much repressed emotion and hotness in one big burst. Ow.
• Jack's short little cruising scene after that first rodeo. So incidental to the rest of the movie, but exactly what it needed to be. Subtle in action, showing everything we need to know about him (overly brash despite his intentions - you get a shot of those guys from across the room and the ending of the movie is practically already laid out in my mind) and his differences from Ennis. He is louder, more physical, miles more direct in his intentions. There is this intense sadness where you know this is not going to work.
• And in that same vein, the corny (yet utterly delicious and perfect and already overused by me) "I wish I knew how to quit you" scene, where Jack is entirely angry at Ennis for ruining what could be perfect (in his mind, at least), but you know it would never work because of how Ennis has been raised and who he is and you feel completely for both of them but it doesn't matter because it's not going to be real and man look at me go on. Repeat after me: This is just a movie.
• We're not even going to get into the ending scenes with Jack's parents and the shirts and the breaking of my poor dorky heart, but it's ridiculous how affecting this whole thing is to me.

So yeah, that was a little uncomfortable, all that emotional spewing all over the internet, but I felt like I should say something, because it did mess with me in a way very few things can these days.

Best movie of the year. Even better than Serenity.