Brokeback Mountain

On Saturday night Josh, Amy, Mark and I went to the premier screening of Brokeback Mountain at the Denver Opera House***, the big ticket film at the Denver Film Society. Ang Lee was there to accept a "Career Achievement Award" as well as give us his insight on the film as well as watch as the audience experienced the story.

First off the Denver Opera House is beautiful, it has this giant light in the center that retracts into the ceiling when the theater darkens - its like the moth fan that greg d is hoping to install into the loft. The Seats have a reclining seat with lower lumbar support and a head rest (these were ok - I think they were built for a taller torso - I suspect Scott would love them). As we filled the theater (yes, it was a SOLD OUT event) it was refreshing to see such a diverse crowd. Yay Denver!!

The movie was an extremely powerful love story between two cowboys who keep their relationship in the closet. It was based on the short story by Annie Proulx, a Denver resident, and then it was adapted to a screen play by Larry McMurty (Mr. Western). The movie illustrated how damaging our social prejudices can be, especially in middle america. Although it was set starting in the 60's I don't know how much further the mid-west has come - which makes it even more heartbreaking. I don't think we realized how powerful it was until the next couple of days. We were standing in Target buying travel shaving foam and mark blurted out (as if I was along for the ride in his head) "the piano music was illustrating their love, starting and stopping, starting and stopping" - I looked at him confused, but immediately understood what he was saying. We had many of these moments where it was clear that the movie was still rolling and rolling around in our heads and giving us much to think about. Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger were incredible - although it was tough to understand Heath's character Ennis all of the time.

This is a must see film - even Mark said "one the best films he has seen" (and that was without the NY Times review).

***Thanks Amy for your film connections and finding this awesome event! :)