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Marc
Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 9:31 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
Quote:
But if they'd been bi-sexual, neither of them would have been so tormented during their times away from each other.


people are tormented when they aren't with the one they love, whether they're straight, gay or bisexual.

Closeted they were, but the movie made a point of showing them enjoying sex with women. That's the way I saw it and I'm gay....er queer.
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gromit
Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 9:49 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 9010 Location: Shanghai
Was surprised how powerful and enjoyable Quadrophenia was. Hadn't seen it before.
Sure felt like This Is England used Quad as a template. Another odd film reference I discovered/invented was when Jimmy is wasted on the train late int he film and he moves in a jerky detached manner with dark circles around his eyes, reminding me of ... Max Schreck in Nosferatu. Wonder if that was intentional at all. He is like the walking dead at that point.

Real fine lead performance, dynamic scenes, nice group dynamics from a fine cast. Captures teen angst and culture quite well. Doesn't waste time on Townsend's silly double schizophrenia thematic. I was surprised at how much non-WHO music was in the film, including The Ronettes Be My Baby, which was a nice (unintentional) tribute to the recently deceased Ellie Greenwich. The scooters nevertheless always seem rather weak to an American, though the military-style parkas are pretty kick-ass.

One minor plot strand that seem to have been forgotten -- there was never any repercussion (or even reference) from messing with the gangsters.

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Earl
Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 10:44 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 09 Jun 2004 Posts: 2621 Location: Houston
Granted, been a long time since I saw Brokeback Mountain, but I remember thinking at the time that Jack was clearly enjoying the sex he was having with Anne Hathaway's character in the back seat of the car. (Or was it a truck? Whatever.) Jack was bi, for sure. With Ennis the evidence was less clear, but he probably was, too.

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Earl
Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 10:52 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 09 Jun 2004 Posts: 2621 Location: Houston
marantzo wrote:
According to all the research in recent years they have found no evidence of actual male bisexuality and the conclusion so far is that it doesn't exist or it is very rare.



This isn't the first time you've said this and I've never understood where you're coming from. Just out of curiosity, what defines "actual male bisexuality" according to this research you mention? Is it mere attraction to both sexes or are we talking man-on-man/man-on-woman action?

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"I have a suspicion that you are all mad," said Dr. Renard, smiling sociably; "but God forbid that madness should in any way interrupt friendship."
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Marc
Posted: Sun Sep 13, 2009 11:59 pm Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
I know a lot of men and women who are bi-sexual. Back in the late '70s, I briefly lived with two women. We slept together. They were definitely into each, I was definitely into them, and they were definitely into me. It didn't last. It was more than I could handle.

I used to think of myself as a latent bi-sexual with heterosexual guilt feelings.
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Ghulam
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 1:12 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 4742 Location: Upstate NY
The Russian film Alexandra (2007) shows an elderly woman taking a trip to Chechnya where her grandson soldier is posted close to the war zone. She talks with many Russian soldiers as well as with some Chechnyans in the area with whom she develops a warm relationship. It is a dull and somewhat pretentious anti-war movie. The director Aleksander Sokurov also made Russian Ark, which too I did not much care for, in spite of its technical feat.

.
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Joe Vitus
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:16 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 14498 Location: Houston
marantzo wrote:
According to all the research in recent years they have found no evidence of actual male bisexuality and the conclusion so far is that it doesn't exist or it is very rare.

Gays men are men of course, and as Lenny Bruce said, "Guys will schtup mud." Very Happy


You've made this moronic statement before. Some nonesense about wires attached to men when they look at men and women. But the lie seems to give you an odd sense of comfort. There are bisexual men. The characters in Brokeback don't represent them.

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Joe Vitus
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 2:25 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 14498 Location: Houston
I should add that I thought Brokeback was a stunningly false, artificial movie trading in on an "important" theme and not a spark of life in it. Great example of the outdated "prestige picture" concept.

It would have been more believable set in the 40's and 50's, rather than the 60's and 70's. Certainly set when it is, how could Gyllenhaal's charater drive through Texas on his way to Mexico and never hear anything about the three major urban centers with gay communities? They were famous across the midwest and the south, and drew tons of men who didn't have the courage to come out in their hometowns and states? How would he even find out that he could get sex from men in Mexico without knowing it was easily available in Austin, Dallas, and Houston? It's ludicrous.

But even moving it back a couple of decades, Ledger's character never once looking in his tackle box or ever bringing back a fish just to cover his tracks would be a ridculously untrue bit of characterization.

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billyweeds
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:04 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
Though I think Brokeback Mountain was a good movie--well acted and directed and consistently interesting--I'm closer to Joe's point of view than most other people's. IMO it was nowhere near as wonderful as most folks argue. And his point about the cluelessness of Gyllenhaal's character is extremely well taken.
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Joe Vitus
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:28 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 14498 Location: Houston
Thanks. It should be stressed that it's the writers' cluelessness that's at fault, not the character's. How is the character supposed to get around and find tricks in Mexico, when he can't find one in the entire USA? Where'd he learn about Mexican cruising grounds from? Presumably gay men he met in the US. Who could have told him about crusing grounds in the US. I guess he spoke Spanish better than he spoke cowboy. A good script would explain these things.

If you've ever read anything from gay men in the 50's, and particularly interviews with out-in-the-50s-and-living-in-Oklahoma-gay author James Barr, you know how completely false this movie is. But people have their new-found stereotypes which are are hopeless as old-time stereotype. "Well, it was before Ellen. It was before Harvey Milk. No gays knew any other gay except maybe in Greenwich Village and they all chased straight dick and got beat up for it because they were all so deeply closeted and alienated from each other." The times were tough, no doubt, but this condescending attitude just piles on more falsehoods and makes understanding what things were like for gays back then (and most of Brokeback takes place after Stonewall!) more impossible.

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marantzo
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 7:32 am Reply with quote
Guest
Hey, look up the studies. If you don't trust them, then you don't. The men who claimed to be bi-sexual were not aroused by women in the tests they did. The ones who did these tests noted that the results weren't to be taken as proving that their weren't bi-sexual men, but that it is probably a very rare condition. The testing was of people with a modern western cultural background so it might be different in other cultures. There was also a very big study of some flies (fruit flies?) that for some reason are subjects that have a very similar sexual makeup to humans, which showed the same result. It was a very complicated study and I couldn't grasp all of what the scientist who headed the study was saying. It concerned a wide spectrum of sexual proclivities. When she was asked if the results they found also applied to females, she said that the female sexual makeup is a whole different animal.

Bi-sexuality in women doesn't seem to be a rare condition. Laughing

I imagine it is common knowledge that many gay men don't accept the bi-sexual claims, and accuse those who do as just not wanting to accept the fact that they are gay.

In my humble opinion, if a guy get a hummer at some time from gay guy, that doesn't mean he is necessarily gay or bi-sexual. If it is a lot more than that, I'd have a hard time believing that he wasn't Bi (if there is such a thing) or Gay. I'm not talking from any personal experience but from stories that I have heard from guys over the years.

Anyway, I have no horse in this race and I don't care if bi-sexuality (in men) is common or non-existent, but I find it interesting.
marantzo
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 8:08 am Reply with quote
Guest
Where I grew up gays, from quite a young age, banded together and had their own sort of language and signals, etc. These were the obvious gays (though that wasn't one of the many names they were known by in those days), who didn't make much of an effort to hide their preference. This was in the 50's. There were two unabashed gay guys in our junior high and high school who would hang with the bad guys in school. In those days the bad guys in school were nothing compared to what goes on today. They used to get hummers from their two gay play things. Down by the river actually. I used to hear from members of this gang, about the difference between these two in the oral sex department. Some preferred one and some preferred the other. A discerning group. And they protected their two punks. It was a good arrangement. Very Happy

Gays had to put up with a lot of ridicule in those days and the odd beating by some Neanderthals who would go to the legislative grounds where they used to hang out at night. One time these rednecks got a beating from them. The gays who hung out there recruited a few of their very tough gay friends as protection and the thugs got a big surprise and a big embarrassment. The harassment stopped. This was also in the 50's.
billyweeds
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 8:09 am Reply with quote
Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City
Weirdly--and, possibly, for the first time--I think both Joe and Gary have posted two excellent comments back to back.

Can't we all just get along? Smile
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marantzo
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 8:42 am Reply with quote
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The only gays I haven't got along with were lesbians. Laughing Some are a very angry bunch.

Now, heterosexuals, I've had problems with them. Wink
Marc
Posted: Mon Sep 14, 2009 11:16 am Reply with quote
Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424
I found Brokeback Mountain boring for the first 45 minutes. Beautifully shot but boring. Heath Ledger's much praised performance was also underwhelming to me. The character's inarticulateness became frustrating. But, I was ultimately moved by the love story and the sense of loss at the end. I agree it is not a "great" picture. It reminded me of one of those middling modern American melodramas like "Everybody's All American". But, I found it moving none the less. I initially described it as "profoundly" moving. In retrospect, I might have overreacted. It really isn't a profound movie. I'm a sucker for sad endings. I love "Terms Of Endearment" for example. Ang Lee tried to make a film about a complex and , to some, a controversial subject while still drawing an audience. I think for that reason he didn't get into the details of gay culture of the time - the cities where gays cruised etc. I think he included the beating death of Jack Twist not because it was common place at the time but because it is still going on in this day and age in the deaths of boys like Matthew Sheppard. It was a reminder that homophobia is still very much alive.
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