Title: Brokeback Mountain
Director: Ang Lee
Actors: Jake Gyllenhaal, Heath Ledger, Michelle Williams, Anne Hathway
Run Time: 134 mins

This movie was hyped up a lot and I thought I would not let that stop me. And I was right to not let it stop me, because it was a very good movie. I loved the scenery. I am a sucker for scenery as you might have noticed! It was a gorgeous landscape, the woods, the stream and everything was right in place.

I assume everyone knows by now what the movie is about and I think that calling it a 'gay cowboy movie' is not doing it justice. It is so much more than that. It is an almost mythological doomed passionate relationship between two men. Although, when you are watching it you pretty much forget it is about two men and view it as a relationship between two people who are in love (although I might be slightly predisposed on this one)

Heath Ledger (AUSSIE!!!) is great as the repressed Ennis. He is not only repressed as far as his feelings for Jack (Jake Gyllenhaal) go, but in everything he does he has a certain repressed aura about him. I am very sure it has a lot to do with his upbringing. I got the impression he was raised in a family in which they did not really talk about their feelings and that is why he hardly talks about his true feelings. I think he deserved the Oscar instead of Philip Seymour Hoffman, but I'm not a stuffy old member of the Academy.

Jake Gyllenhaal was also fantastic as the more open Jack Twist. He seemed a lot happier and more willing to take the plunge and live a happy life with Ennis. I, too, would want to get away from that annoying father-in-law of his. I loved the scene in which he stood up to him, when he was constantly undermining his authority over his son.

A lot of people say that this movie is over-rated and it wouldn't have been this popular if it was about a straight couple. I didn't think so and I think people who say that didn't get the point of the movie. The point would have been lost if it was about a straight couple (unless they were of mixed race). I think it deserved all the attention that it got. I have been reading a few things on the net about the opinions of people on this movie and people have been accusing others of being gay if they liked this movie. Also people have trashed this movie without having seen it. That is so childish. What does one's sexuality have anything to do with what movies they like or not. I know a few gay men (the supposed audience) who didn't like this movie and straight people who loved it. And how can you judge a movie if you haven't seen it? Don't judge a book by it's cover is a cliched phrase that apparently is not cliche enough, since people keep doing it.

Anyway, enough about that. That is one of the things in this world that keeps puzzling me and I will never get. I give this movie a solid 8.5 and will buy the DVD when it gets released.

On a side note: good to know it's not only lesbian movies that are very depressing!