Girl's Don't Fall In Love With Fun.

Brokeback Mountain... I don't know what to say about it. I really don't. I've watched it so many times, and every time it burrows its way inside me and makes me feel things I didn't realise I could feel. Truly.

I remember reading the short story on which this is based, many years ago, long before the film was released. I'd been following the development of the film for a while as well, hearing different names attached to it, noting the length of time between when it wrapped principal photography and finally appeared at Venice. I just kept waiting and waiting, having heard that the script had been touted for years in Hollywood as the best script that would never get made (got that wrong, didn't they!)


What struck me when I first saw the film in late 2005 after almost bursting into tears when trying to get a taxi in 45 degree celcius Sydney heat to a media screening of the film saw me arrive just in the nick of time, was that the film plays so remarkably close to the original short story by Annie Proulx. Quite remarkably. The story is, after all, short - my memory is telling me it runs somewhere in the vicinity of forty pages. The film is somewhat longer - a little over two hours. Definitely not even a short feature film. But screenwriters Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry, and director Ang Lee, hone and hone the film, allowing every second to count while stretching them out to the lifetime of the characters, giving Jack (Jake Gyllenhall) and Ennis (Heath Ledger) so much room to breathe at and to each other, and away from each other, to their wives Lureen (Anne Hathaway) and Alma (Michelle Williams), their children, their families. The land itself becomes a character, imposing beauty with the sharp edge of hostility everywhere they went.


But it's all about their love, and the trauma that brings to the two. It is quite obviously a gay love story - they are two men - but it is really just like any story of illicit love. What they do could get them killed, in much the same way as Romeo and Juliet operated. They hide their love and try and go on as normal, and the most overtly political statement of the film is a look at the destruction to the traditional family unit that those lies cause.


But Brokeback Mountain doesn't set out to be political. It is a love story between two cowboys in a time when a love story between two guys wasn't even a possibility out in Wyoming. And that love story is heartbreakingly beautiful. A huge credit has to go to Ossana and McMurtry for the stunning screenplay, with definite credit to Proulx as much of the dialogue did originate in her short story, and the lines spoken are oft apt to reach into your chest and stop your heart. The actors took a bow of some description with Oscar noms for Ledger, Gyllenhall and Williams, though supports from Randy Quaid, Linda Cardellini and Anna Faris, as well as Hathaway in her breakaway from her previous children-orientated roles, are notable. Lee's touch directing the picture saw him walk away with the golden man, and it truly is one of the most gently and simply directed films I have seen, but with power running through every scene. Gustavo Santaolalla created the instantly recognisable original score, which I often find myself quietly listening to in moments of reflection, and Rodrigo Prieto captures the images with serene beauty, as well as pulling off a memorable momentary cameo as a Mexican prostitute.


This feels like it rambles all over the place, formless, but that's how the film makes me feel. And there are so many quotes, phrases and words from the film that could be been referenced here in place of structure, but that would only serve to cheapen the power of them when spoken in the picture. Just let it be said that the final scene, the final unfinished sentence inside Ennis' trailer, is just about the only scene that, whether I'm reading the short story or watching the film, will floor me every time. Never a dry eye, and that is unlike any other film I've seen. 5 stars.

Being Tough Won't Make You Smart.

I do believe my initial viewing of Amores Perros came after Y Tu Mamá También, and was probably as a direct result of my love for the latter. Don't ask me to choose between them. It's like asking to choose your favourite child.


Amores Perros (Love's A Bitch - I like the Spanish original better) is the debut feature from director Alejandro González Iñárritu, who went on to 21 Grams and Babel, as well as the debut feature for writer (and collaborator on all of Iñárritu's features thus far completed) Guillermo Arriaga, who has also written and directed Blindness since his falling out with Iñárritu.

As notable as the introduction of the writing and directing talent was the introduction of Gael García Bernal, in the role of Octavio. His blistering performance in the first segment of the film completely draws you into the world that he is constantly running within - his fear always shows through his bravado always just enough to let you know that, really, he isn't in this for the same reasons as everyone else. He's scared.


But we're getting a little ahead of ourselves.


The film is structured into three distinct but overlapping stories, bound in the middle by a car crash. Octavio and his friend are making money from dogfighting in order that Octavio can run away with his sister-in-law, who he is in love with yet is being beaten by her husband, Octavio's husband. They get themselves into a spot of bother and BAM, car crash. So ends that story (for the most part - it's revisited at the end.)


Meanwhile, model Valeria (Goya Toledo) is having an illicit affair with a magazine (editor? publisher?) Daniel (Álvaro Guerrero.) She ducks out to get some wine and BAM, car crash. The story follows her rehabilitation from horrible fractures and her mental undoing as her dog disappears under the floorboards and more medical problems ensue.


Lastly, El Chivo (Emilio Echevarría) is a former con, now almost homeless, an ex-bum being thrown criminal jobs by a crooked cop. He is set up for an assassination and then BAM, car crash. The dog Octavio had been carrying is now in his care (he's apparently a mammoth dog lover), and things begin to take him a little bit longer. Plus, he's trying to reconnect with his daughter, who is under the impression that he died when he actually went to prison decades earlier.


That's the basic gist of it. I don't really want to give away any plot points beyond what I've already done (there are probably spoilers already - deal with it) so I'm going to leave it at those very rudimentary breakdowns of the three storylines. They all link up in more ways than the car crash and the dog element, however. Oh, don't worry, there are SO many more layers happening here it hurts.


The acting is uniformly. The concept is brilliant as a script and perfectly executed on the screen. Tonally, the three are very different, but this works perfectly - lives are all very different, and as a demonstration of how one random incident can affect people in very different ways it is powerfully effective. The cinematographical changes tie in with the tone, though very subtly - Rodrigo Prieto (who went on to an Oscar nom for Brokeback Mountain, amongst much other terrific work on a number of films) captures it stunningly.


I really don't have a bad word to say about it. Seriously, these Mexicans (and Fernando Meirelles, who is Brazilian) are amazing. It hurts me. That region (a broad generalisation of two large countries, I know, but get over it) produced some of the most phenomenal films of the last few decades in the space of a few years. I don't know what's in the water, but maybe I need to move there next. 5 stars.