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Feature
Brokeback Mountain
Director Ang Lee tells Metro about the film that had to be made
“I hate evoking anger,” admits Ang Lee. Yet by mixing the most “American” movie genre — the Western — with gay themes, the director realizes this could well be the impact of his latest cinematic masterpiece, Brokeback Mountain.
“I tried not to think about the possible results while I was filming,” the Academy Award-winner confesses during a recent in-person interview. “It might have prevented me from telling the story I needed to.” Rather than trying to make a political or social statement — though he recognizes both are possible — Lee focused on making the best possible adaptation of Pulitzer Prize-winner E. Annie Proulx’s short story.
Adapted for the screen by fellow Pulitzer-winner Larry McMurtry (Lonesome Dove), Brokeback Mountain chronicles a 20-year emotional and sexual bond formed between Texas rodeo cowboy Jack Twist and Wyoming ranch hand Ennis Del Mar while herding sheep in the contemporary West during the summer of 1963. Filled with romance, longing, heartache and loss, in Lee’s hands, it becomes a classic, tragic love story.
While the film might seem a surprising choice for a director who exploded into the public consciousness with the 2000 martial arts epic and Oscar-favorite Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Lee is no stranger to gay-themed films.
Lee wrote and directed the 1993 critic darling The Wedding Banquet, which revolves around a marriage of convenience between a gay Chinese immigrant and his neighbor. When the man’s parents arrive in America to celebrate the wedding, insanity ensues.
“I wrote that film to challenge my upbringing,” says the Taiwanese-born Lee of his generational and cultural examination. “In my culture, to have a gay son is the ultimate shame. I wanted to raise consciousness around that by showing it in film.”
With films such as Eat Drink Man Woman, Lee has long been a staple on the Oscar and art house circuit. His first mainstream Hollywood film, Sense & Sensibility, earned Lee the Best Director nod from the National Board of Review and the New York Film Critics Circle. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon garnered an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and Golden Globe for Best Director.
Following critical success, Lee tackled the big-budget Hulk. Costing more than $120 million to shoot, the film reeled in a quarter-billion dollars worldwide. While the comic book adaptation proved his greatest box office success, it took its toll.
“After Hulk, I was wrecked!” Lee says. “I was just exhausted. I really thought I was done making films for a while.
That changed when his longtime collaborative partner and Oscar-winner James Schamus, who now heads Focus Features, told him Brokeback Mountain was still unmade. Approached with the script previously, Lee was already committed to Hulk.
“I knew I would be so jealous if someone else did [Brokeback Mountain],” he admits. “This is a film that had to be made.”
With that in mind, the pair set about securing funding — much of it from abroad — and started casting. To anchor Brokeback, Lee chose Jake Gyllenhaal (Jarheads) as Jack and cast Heath Ledger (Lords of Dogtown) as Ennis. Showing shades of a young Sally Field, Dawson’s Creek alumna and Ledger’s real-life fiancée, Michelle Williams, plays Ennis’ wife Alma to sullen and rejected perfection. Anne Hathaway finds herself a long way from The Princess Diaries as Jack’s bitter, angry wife Lureen.
With the film spanning a 20-year period, Lee says he knew from the start he wanted to age younger actors. “There is no way to recreate that innocence,” he points out. Additionally, viewers have less preconceived notions about lesser-known talent. Says Lee, “Actors in their 30s have been around 15, sometimes 20 years already.”
In preparation for the roles, the leads were sent to “cowboy school” to get hands-on experience with horseback riding and ranch work. Lee says Ledger, already familiar with farm life, was bored. Gyllenhaal, who the director describes as a “city boy,” was frustrated by splinters, bloodied hands and all that goes with building fences, feeding animals and moving bails of hay.
“We tried to rough him up a bit. There’s nothing I could do to make Jake look like a cowboy,” Lee jokes, “But they looked like they would make a good couple.”
As Lee hoped, the men also used the time to bond, which becomes more than obvious during their raw, powerful, on-screen love scenes. Though the director admits making Brokeback Mountain presents a certain professional risk for all involved, he does not find the act particularly “brave” of his stars. “They’re actors,” he notes. “Of course they want juicy parts.”
“I’m not their manager. I don’t care if this movie dooms the rest of their careers,” he half-jokes. “All I cared about was that they performed for me.” Besides, Lee provides his own unique perspective.
“I was directing a gay Western set in the mountains of Wyoming, and there is nothing further from my personal experience,” he says. “If I can do it and make it convincing, so can they.”
Paul E. Pratt is a San Francisco-based entertainment and features writer. To read more of his articles, visit: http://www.PaulEPratt.com.
Brokeback Mountain Review
Brokeback Mountain
Directed by Ang Lee
Based on a short story by E. Annie Proulx
Screenplay by Larry McMurtry
Starring Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway and Michelle Williams
Opens in limited release Dec. 9
Opens in Salt Lake City Jan. 9 at the Broadway Centre Theatre, 111 E. Broadway
Watch for a special event sponsored in part by QSaltLake to be announced in our enxt issue.
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