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Brokeback
Mountain: Heartbreak by Proxy Even in metropolitan Seattle, Brokeback Mountain is known as the gay cowboy movie. While that’s not such a black mark against it here—far from being banned, this small film is playing in three different theaters within the city—it still seems to be overriding the truth about the story being told. Rather than being categorized as strictly gay cinema, it should also be associated with every fine, agonizing, heartbreaking movie about star-crossed lovers and what cannot be, despite how fervently it might be wished for. Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) meet by chance, as they’re both hired to guide the same sheep herd through the mountains of Wyoming. They become friendly acquaintances, as much as they can be considering they have different duties keeping them apart most days. The way in which they become lovers is perfect, painful, and appropriate for two straight-laced cowboys. It was the part I wondered about the most—if the two characters were supposed to be conservative ranch hands, how could this ever happen? Brokeback orchestrates it perfectly, in a way that’s both wrenching and utterly believable. After the herd of sheep reaches its destination, Ennis and Jack have no choice but to part ways. The rest of the film is the overlapping of their lives over the next 20 years. Both marry, dragging two unsuspecting women into their conflicted lives. These parts could have easily been peripheral, two-dimensional girlfriend characters that served only to underscore the main characters’ struggle, but wonderfully, that’s not the case here. Michelle Williams as Alma, Ennis’s wife, is as subtle and stoic as Ledger, and her few explosions are just as memorable. Anne Hathaway plays Lureen, the cowgirl who claims Jack. She’s great as a spunky, forward young woman, but as her character ages, her performance takes a backseat to Lureen’s physical transformation. The extraordinary thing about Brokeback Mountain is what it leaves unsaid. The dialogue and spoken interactions between characters are uniformly great, but the silent moments between characters whose very relationship is silent, speaks volumes. In certain scenes between them, five seconds of pregnant silence says more than the entirety of other scenes in the film, and that’s not meant to denigrate those other scenes. Ledger seems to be getting the most dramatic attention of the two leads, and while it’s certainly deserved, his strong and silent Ennis would be far less noteworthy without Gyllenhaal’s gregarious Jack Twist. His optimistic, buoyant portrayal provides the perfect counterpoint to Ledger’s painfully realistic Ennis. It’s true that Ledger says volumes in a look—even just a look at the ground—but without Gyllenhaal’s understated performance, he’d have no one to be saying it to. Had either actor been less capable, none of the pained, significant looks would have meant anything, as we’d have had no sense of the enormous risk the characters were taking. It’s too early to say if Brokeback Mountain will be eclipsed by the nature of the relationship between its two main characters. It’s being nominated for awards, and winning many of them, and it would be wonderful if that’s a sign of things to come and of this film reaching a wider audience. Particularly right now, when we’re entering the cinematic desert of January and February, when most new releases won’t be worth your time or money, it’s a great alternative. Not only will you avoid something terrible, you’ll see something wonderful—a haunting story that will stay with you for days afterwards. Bottom line:
Ride into the nearest theatre to see it. |
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Final Resort:
Last Holiday A mild-mannered, cautious New Orleans sales clerk learns she has three weeks to live. Savings in hand, she jets to a posh European hotel for a last fling, her first and only stab at the life she always wanted. What happens there is Last Holiday, a romantic comedy, directed by Wayne Wang and starring Queen Latifah and LL Cool J. Both rose to the movie big leagues via hip-hop, a business that has bred its share of actors. Snoop Dog, Ice T, and the pair in question have bridged the gap from rap to celluloid, more or less gracefully. But where Snoop and Ice T seem to gravitate toward noirish or action fare, Latifah has picked her projects with increasing skill and judgment. Moving from television to a few forgettable comedy films, she finally struck gold with Chicago. Holding her own against Zellweger and Zeta-Jones, she acted her age, sang, and shimmied her way into consideration as a serious film talent. Here, Latifah shares the screen with Gerard Depardieu as a superstar chef. Playing an obnoxious billionaire is Timothy Hutton, a romantic comedian in the tradition of James Garner and his own daddy, Jim Hutton. Both give the Queen good support. Still, Last Holiday tries to be too many things. It’s romantic comedy, with Latifah’s Georgia Byrd pining over Cool J’s Sean, a fellow clerk. It’s farce, with mistaken facts, overheard secrets, snoopy hotel clerks, and physical humor. Then it slips in a little spirituality, with the apparent unfairness of God’s will, and the regrets of the road-not-taken. If that’s not enough, there’s class warfare, rich versus poor, demanding snobs and suffering servants. Finally, two mildly shady American legislators, junketing at the resort, allow Georgia to voice some populist wisdom in the Frank Capra tradition. Any of the above would be an appropriate theme for a movie. All together, in one movie, they would tax the acting and comedic chops of any ensemble. Still, the actors do their best. As Georgia, Latifah provides some genuinely poignant moments, struggling to accept her fate. There is one very good scene in which Georgia is singing in her church choir, and starts asking, “Why me, God?” The congregation, swinging along in mid-service, joins in with her, until all are shouting and imploring heaven. The result is funny, sad, and pretty much what would likely happen in a New Orleans church. Depardieu exudes worldly wisdom as hotel chef Didier, who knows the Secret of Life (“Butter,” he says). Cool J seems underused as Sean, but that may just be the part. For the rest, there’s beautiful Czech Republic scenery, tables of gorgeous haute cuisine, and plenty of clothing changes for Latifah. She scores a new outfit for every scene. Altogether, Last Holiday is a very pretty, rather busy film, one that takes you by the hand, then tugs you, then slaps you backward, and never quite lets you know what to make of it. Bottom Line:
Latifah and Company rise above the material. |
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