“Tell you what, we coulda had a good life together, fuckin’ real good life! Had us a place of our own. But you didn’t want it, Ennis! So what we got now is Brokeback Mountain! Everything’s built on that, that’s all we got boy, fuckin’ all. So I hope you know that, if you don’t never know the rest! You count the damn few times we have been together in nearly twenty years and you measure the short fucking leash you keep me on, and then you ask me about México and tell me you’ll kill me for needing somethin’ I don’t hardly never get.”
This is the final film to be a part of the Minneapolis St. Paul International Film Festival’s (MSPIFF) tribute to the two time Academy Award winning director Ang Lee (who also made 2012’s “Life of Pi” and the 2000 film “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”) where Lee was able to introduce a screening of his legendary 2005 masterpiece “Brokeback Mountain.”
The plot starts in 1963 and follows two cowboys in rural Wyoming named Ennis Del Mar (played by the late Heath Ledger, who won an Oscar for 2008’s “The Dark Knight”) and Jack Twist (played by Jake Gyllenhaal, star of 2007’s “Zodiac”) who begin working as sheep herders on Brokeback Mountain throughout thea summer. Jack and Ennis begin spending time with each other to pass the time, and soon fall in love. But because homosexuality was criminalized at the time, they went their separate ways after the season ended.
Ennis marries his longtime fiancée Alma (played by Michelle Williams, star of 2022’s “The Fablemans”) and has two daughters with her. While working as a rodeo rider, Jack meets a girl named Lureen Newsome (played by Anne Hathaway, who won an Oscar for 2012’s “Les Misérables”) and they have a son. After four years, Jack reaches out to Ennis to rekindle their relationship, and they embark on a journey over the next 20 years. But Alma accidentally discovers their love for each other, and grapples with Ennis’ infidelity silently until she cannot take it anymore.
The film was also produced by a Minnesota-based production company named River Road Entertainment and financed by Bill Pohlad. It was Pohlad who was able to help get Lee to attend MSPIFF this year.
“You have to put the camera in the center of your heart. I think that’s what it is. To me, it’s acting. So actors are very close to me. I say those brutal, short words to them, I can feel they love me for some reason. At least I believe that they have that look in them,” Lee said.
In contrast to Lee’s previous Oscar-winning film from 2000, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” the score eschews large orchestras and grand instrumentation, opting for hauntingly beautiful guitar melodies. This is the work of composer Gustavo Santaolalla (who would later go on to compose music for the 2013 video game “The Last of Us” along with its 2020 sequel and HBO adaptation). He won the Oscar for Best Original Score for “Brokeback Mountain” in a surprising upset over John Williams’ work in “Memoirs of a Geisha” (which also starred Zhāng Zǐyí, of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” fame). Santaolalla would also win the Oscar again the following year, for Alejandro González Iñárritu’s 2006 film “Babel.”
While Lee was able to win Best Director, and the film still won Best Adapted Screenplay, it controversially lost the Academy Award for Best Picture to 2004’s “Crash.” To this day, this loss is seen as one of the worst decisions in Oscar history.
Ledger gives one of his finest ever performances as Ennis, and it is a shame how he was taken from this earth so young. Gyllenhaal was also incredible, and this film still marks his only Oscar nomination.
While introducing the film at MSPIFF, Lee had a few words to say about his time making it.
“I read Annie Proulx’s short story and I cried. I say, I grew up in Táiwān, what does gay Wyoming cowboys [have] anything to do with me? They don’t know what gets them and they spend 20 years chasing it; that’s their Brokeback Mountain. What a beautiful story.” Lee said. “After my father passed away, I needed to process my grief. So, I just tried to rest while making a movie. That’s the movie that, I believe, if there is a movie God that he loves me, he nurtured me back with such a nurturing movie. I think that’s what the whole world feels about it. its existence brought me back to the love of making movies again, and back to life again … I cannot claim credit on this; everybody’s so good in the movie, it’s a perfect movie!”
Long after we have all forgotten that there was ever a movie called “Crash,” we will always have “Brokeback Mountain.” This is a profound and beautiful film that will endure forever in our hearts. My final rating for “Brokeback Mountain” is a perfect 10/10.