brokeback mountain...

I have not written anything about the movie Brokeback Mountain on purpose. I saw it two weeks ago when it first came out in Chicago. I also have read the short story - three times.

The reason I have not written is because I saw the movie with an audience that was 95-99% gay and I wanted to see it again with an audience that is at least 95% straight. I want to see the differences in reaction. [I thought I was going to do that tonight at a suburban theatre with a friend, but I have the plague. It's what happens when you spend Christmas with a 2-year old, 4-year old, and 5-year old. They carry diseases you thought you could never catch.]

My main reasons for wanting to do it this way are first to see if there is a major different overall reaction between the audiences and second to discover why the gay audience laughed at very inappropriate moments in the movie. They were powerfully sad moments and the laughter was not nervous laughter or surprise laughter as when something unexpected happens in a movie. They were amused at what was happening.

So, I decided to make some comments now while I have thoughts fresh in my mind and then post again after seeing it with a straight audience. It could also give me a different impression because I have spent a lot of time thinking about Brokeback Mountain.

My own personal reaction, though it is skewed because of my take on the short story, is extremely positive. I really, really didn't like the short story. Not even re-reading it the week before I saw the movie. I think it is very poorly written contrary to everyone else's thoughts and not deserving of the O'Henry award and another it received. It is actually too long for a short story and too short for a novella. It is lacking in a cohesive character development.

Before anyone comments that a short story can be limited because of its length, I have to offer up O'Henry's The Ransom of Red Chief. You know exactly what all the characters are like in that story. You feel their dilemmas, especially because of your attraction and repulsion for Red Chief! You can't have character development better than this.

Ennis Del Mar comes across as an ass in the Brokeback short story in my opinion. He knows what he wants; he doesn't know what he wants; he treats Jack like a jerk; he treats Jack as the most important thing in his life; he treats his wife like a nothing; his family is everything to him. Heath Ledger, in the movie, adds the depth and dimension lacking in the story. You know where the conflict is coming from within him

Jack Twist is not a gay man in the story but a victim of circumstance right until the very end. He knows what he wants and he knows he can't have it. He realizes that he can have no control over anyone but himself. In the movie, Jake Gyllenhall gives Jack the personality he needs.

Ennis and Jack become two very believeable characters.

These two actors give the movie, along with Ang Lee's direction and Larry McMurtry's writing, what is missing in the short story. The other characters are also developed better. It is important to know about their lives away from each other and of both of their wives. The written story doesn't give as much of an insight. Because of these things the movie is tremendously better than the story. Usually, it's the other way around: the story is better than the movie.

My personal reaction to the movie did not hit during or right after I saw the movie. It hit me three days later when the impact of what is in the movie suddenly connected with my own life. Boy, did it hit! I had a breakdown that lasted all the way to work in the car. [I don't know why but breakdowns always happen to me in the car.]

I saw the hopeless situation that the two men were in and didn't know of a way out of. I also saw that the hopelessness was of their own making. Jack has a way out, but Ennis stops it, or, rather, can't imagine it. Yes, it does have to do with the time that the story takes place [1963-83] but there are stories of people who took the route in spite of it. [I'm being vague on purpose for anyone who has not seen it yet. I DO recommend everyone see it to make their own decisions.]

As a consequence, I saw the hopeless situations I had put myself into by not realizing that I had innumerable possibilities. Though I now know of these possibillities, I still can put myself into the hopelessness. All of us can. Knowing something and action are two different things. Everyone knows how to lose weight - diet and exercise. However, knowing about it doesn't lose the weight. Actually doing it is a completely different thing.

The passage of time is very important to the story but it does not come across too well in the written version. The movie uses it to the fullest advantage. Just seeing the 80's Jack is to see how time has affected the two men. The aging on Ennis is done without make-up, as far as I can tell. Ledger's transformation in the movie is remarkable, especially since you know it is from all of the torment Ennis created for himself.

This is an extremely personal movie. It is a love story as the reviews and commentaries say. Everyone can identify with something in the movie, even if it is the scenery that is stupendous. [We have spent the last two vacations at the site of the filming, actually arriving right after the filming completed.]

As far as the sex, the AFA and Pat Robertson have nothing to worry about. The gay sex is practically non-existent. There is a lot of rolling around and liplocking, but only one time that there is no doubt what is going on. The sex that is prevalent is all straight boobie sex with Jack's and Ennis' wives. The gay audience had very little reaction to it. The AFA and Robertson should be shocked by this not the gay theme.

What had the greatest affect on me the most were the simple unspoken thoughts, the holding, the caressing, the cuddling and the quiet moments between Ennis and Jack. These moments spoke volumes about what was going on. It was not a sex movie; it was a loving, compassionate story between two men who knew what was important to them but couldn't act. These moments are what life, romance and uniting are all about, not the sex, and it is broadcast very well in my opinion.

Academy Awards? I leave that to the politicking in Hollywood. Brokeback Mountain is a movie that was ready to be made, to be seen, to be discussed and finally with which to be identified. No matter who you are. It is a step in the right direction.



A hint: there is a symbol mentioned more than once in the movie that is very important. It is also talked about in the short story. It is important because it answers a question that is not explored deeply in the short story but holds the crux to Ennis' actions. The film has a much better handle on it.

As an aside, I can't get over the music either. It all fit so beautifully and added to the movie at all the right moments and you weren't even aware of it. The album is wonderful.

Merry, merry...

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus

Editorial Page, New York Sun, 1897

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:

Dear Editor,

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If you see it in The Sun, it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?

Virginia O'Hanlon


Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except what they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.



I really do believe that there is a Santa Claus. It makes no sense to believe in the president, the pope, or any of the other stories if you don't believe in Santa Claus. They hold no hope. Santa Claus is full of hope. As the native American Hopi adage goes, "When hope is gone life is over."

Lately, it sure seems like hope is going, if not yet gone. We are hit in the forehead daily with dismal news from around the world and in our country. People are hated just for being who they are. People are not trusted because of their familial background. People are dismissed because of who they love. People are diminished because of what they believe.

Usually, all of this is done in the name of some god. A god who is usually acknowledged as all-forgiving, all-loving, and all-enclusive. Believers of these gods spout off on beliefs and add their own, "Yes, but..." None of their gods have a "Yes, but..." in the theology. Righteousness is not an attribute of very many gods, but their followers are filled with it.

Santa Claus has no "Yes, but..." or righteousness. Santa Claus is hope and future. There is no prerequisite to believing in Santa Claus. No one has to swear to his "truth." No one has to belong to the "right" group. No one has to love the "correct" person. Everyone is the same.

These are some of the reasons why I, at the age of 58, believe in Santa Claus. He loves me for who I am just like he loves everyone for who they are - not what they are.

...merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry, merry!

no right to complain...

George Carlin has it all right! He said that he hasn't voted in the last elections because, in his words, "They're all schmucks! All of them!" He says that he has the right to complain about what's going on in the country because he didn't vote.

Yet he hears everyone else complaining about the war, loss of privacy, the economy.... He says, "You don't have the right to complain. You voted for the assholes!"

I'm beginning to believe he's right. You might say, "I didn't vote for Bush. I voted for Kerry." That doesn't make any difference. You and I didn't work hard enough to keep the country safe.

Bush and his minions say everything that they are doing is to keep the country safe. I don't feel safe now that I know that they have been monitoring all communications. The scariest part is that they feel that they are perfectly right in doing everything they are doing.

What they are doing is destroying the Consitution! This man is now worse than Richard Nixon. He believes he's above the law. he believes that he has broad powers. He has betrayed the conservative right, the liberal left and eveyone in between the two.

The pictures of him wearing a crown were a joke. Now I'm not so sure.



Clinton just stained the carpet. Bush is spitting on the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and the people of the United States.

Where are the cries for impeachment?

just asking...

misproven intelligent design...

I have the definitive proof that intelligent design has absolutely no basis.

PUBERTY!

no one intelligent would ever have designed puberty.

think about it...

apology accepted..

...and we feel very sorry for you...

what's the surprise..?

From La Prensa, Managua, Nicaragua, 22 April 2005
Interview with Boff in Buenos Aires.

Boff: "He's a man that has no compassion." (Buenos Aires, EFE)
The Brasilian theologian Leonardo Boff thinks that the German Joseph Ratzinger is " a hard man and without compassion," and says he fears that after his consecration as Pope " an immense hell of hypocrisy will reign in the Church."
Boff, on whom the new Pope once imposed silence as a punishment, assured that the posture of Benedict 16 will be " a radicalized continuation" of the line of the deceased John Paul 2 against the use of contraceptives and " discrimination" against homosexuals and carriers of the AIDS virus.
Ratzinger is a man " without intellectual cordiality" with a posture that is " hard and at times without mercy." in dealing with " all this distant world of problems in which there is suffering and discrimination," the theologian declared to Radio Mitre in Buenos Aires. " I would not like it for this style to spread itself through the whole Church." Boff thinks that some of the positions of the new Pope will divide the Church. " I fear an immense hell of hypocrisy" he said. For this theologian, the appointment of Ratzinger " produces no hope, but instead fear and trembling in many sectors of the Church, especially among women, among those who are asking for the use of contraceptives,
among those living with AIDS, and among homosexuals." He said also that another point of conflict is in relations with the divorced. " Ratzinger has a very narrow conception of the Eucharist. He fights with them (the divorced), he distances them all. This is not to be a pastor. A pastor
accompanies these people, dries their tears, raises their hopes," he emphasized. " He must have a pastoral sense of mediation, of mercy. The Eucharist is not for saints and angels, it is for concrete persons who are sinners, that are open to meet the Lord," he added. Leonardo Boff has been one of the principle exponents of the Theology of Liberation, a liberal tendency that assumes Christian practice with a strong social coloration, and that forcefully struggles with the hierarchy and the Roman curia.

The same Ratzinger as chief of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith was responsible for the silencing imposed on Boff and other representatives of Liberation Theology in Latin Ameria during the time of John Paul 2.


It was expected. JPII had no sense of intellectialization. He was purely a mystic-based scribe, out of touch with the modern world with yearnings for the Middle Ages where the church ran the entire show, kept the people in ignorance and the rulers in fear of hell and its minions, aka the soldiers of Christ. As proof, look at his support of Opus Dei and its founder.

BXVI is the intellectual but he was also evil and a Nazi. Doctrinaire has been a part of the German belief system long before Hitler. Everything is exact, precise and unwavering. Leonardo Boff has been ostracized by the church like all other "thinkers." The church does not like "thinkers." It only wants obedient children. As proof, look at the entire history of the German peoples. Just the words "I was only following orders" sends a chill down my spine.

These two ways of thinking, JPII and BXVI, can explain the problems the church has with North America.

Democracy is not in the best interest of a church that is run on authoritarian premise and relentless dogma. The sad thing is Jesus' thinking and ideals were not autocratic. They were more socialistic and communist. The revolution of his thoughts was that they came from the poor, the downtrodden, the infirmed, the cast offs.

Jesus was the founder and architect of Liberation Theology. The one line of thought that greatly questions the authority of the church by bringing up the original message of Jesus. The church does everything in its power to hide its true beginnings.

The latest proclamations on gay priests, usury [read anti-semitism], and the murder of innocents through refusing to fight AIDS in the one way that we know works, contraception, proves the back peddling is getting faster and more fervent.

So, again, what's the surprise..?

no control... part II

Other Countries Buying Our Debt

Rep. John Tanner (D-Tenn) spoke in the House of the US debt of $1.2 trillion that the Bush government owes to foreign countries and banks who have been buying up our debt. (italics mine)

Money quote (pun intended):

President George W. Bush and the current administration have now borrowed more money from foreign govenments and banks than the previous 42 presidents combined." (bold number mine)

This means that we no longer own our country. It is owned by other governments and banks.

Now, in personal finance, when you owe money to a bank the loan has a date of expiration and a payment schedule. When you or I don't make the dates, guess what the bank does? Takes the collateral.

My first question is: What was put up as collateral?

My second question is: When are the payments due?

My third question is: Who's going to come up with the money for the payments?

My last question is:

...no control, or out of control?

fianally, a test worth taking...

This is the most logical of all tests I have ever seen. It is one that tells the truth and makes you laugh. It's better than a horoscope, the I Ching, and numerology all rolled into one. Try it, if you don't believe me.

What Muppet are you?

Here's who I am:




You are Kermit the Frog.

You are reliable, responsible and caring. And you have a habit of waving your arms about maniacally.

FAVORITE EXPRESSIONS:
"Hi ho!" "Yaaay!" and "Sheesh!"

FAVORITE MOVIE:
"How Green Was My Mother"

LAST BOOK READ:
"Surfin' the Webfoot: A Frog's Guide to the Internet"

HOBBIES:
Sitting in the swamp playing banjo.

QUOTE:
"Hmm, my banjo is wet."

I would rather have been Statler or Waldorf, the two old farts in the balcony, because they made the most sense, were sarcastic and cynical, and got to say whatever they wanted. Kermit is fine with me.

...it ain't easy bein' green!

having your head...

In addition to the limits on write-offs for mortgage interest, the main elements of the proposals would abolish the alternative minimum tax, erase deductions for state and local income and property taxes, restrict tax-free employer-paid health insurance, and reduce the deductions that many taxpayers can claim for charitable donations.

"Panel Urges Big Cut in Mortgage Deduction", New York Times, Wednesday, November 2, 2005

In addition, The top tax rate for the wealthiest taxpayers would be lowered, to 30 percent in one alternative, and 33 percent in the other, from 35 percent now.

Mr. Bush, in theory if not in practice, put this panel together. Besides the changes mentioned above on personal income taxes, it recommends changes for business:

The plans would lower the top tax rate for businesses. One plan would let businesses write off the cost of investments in plants and machinery in the year of the cost, a system known as expensing, and would disallow writing off interest payments.

So, the vast majority of taxpayers, including Bush's base, get the shaft again. Yet, the wingnuts have time to scream about a Supreme Court appointment, same-sex marriage, and abortion rights that effect a small portion of the population. Will they scream that they are going to be poorer again?

More and more I believe that a straight forward tax rate on individuals, no matter what their income, and businesses, no matter what their size, would be the fairest system of all of them. It would generate more income for the the US; it would treat everyone the same; and there would be fewer complications.

Now, to finish the title of this post...

up your ass...

nothing better to do...? part XII

First, I need to clear why I haven't been posting for awhile. I have been incredibly busy. I have been taking a new class with Landmark and assisting at events and in registration. Work has consumed a major part of my life more than usual. My energy (what I have of it) and what little free time has been going into my other blog, existential chaos. PLUS, there really has been nothing out of the disordinary going on because all of it is disordinary!

Meirs? I hope neither she nor Bush backs out. We need a little amusement with all of the hurricanes, earthquakes, etc going on in the world.

Plamegate? What goes around, comes around. When you think you're bigger than life, you fall faster and harder with more pain.

FEMA? Murphy's Law in its raw form. The highest level of incompetence ends just where the sign on Harry Truman's desk in the Oval Office said: "The buck stops here." [Of course Truman also said, "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.]

Iraq? What can I say that everyone else hasn't been saying or starting to say?

On and on it goes.

BUT, here is one thing that fits into the "nothing better to do..." category. Friends have had this email conversation going on about the Starbucks' ad campaign with the sayings from famous and semi-famous people on their cups in order to start "old-fashioned coffee house conversations." [Starbucks words, not mine.]

The religious right were aghast a couple of weeks ago because of an Armistead Maupin quote on one of the cups from Tales of the City that they believed had Starbucks forwarding the "gay agenda." Quel horreur!



You can read the story here: "Tempest brews over quotes on Starbucks' cups," in The Seattle Times.

Soooo, what was Starbucks' response? It pulled the cup from the campaign! AND is including a cup in the spring with a quote from Rev. Rick Warren, author of The Purpose-Driven Life.

"You are not an accident. Your parents may not have planned you, but God did. He wanted you alive and created you for a purpose. Focusing on yourself will never reveal your real purpose. You were made by God and for God, and until you understand that, life will never make sense. Only in God do we discover our origin, our identity, our meaning, our purpose, our significance and our destiny." "Starbucks stirs things up with a God quote on cups," USA Today, 10/19/2005.

What about a quote from Madeline Murray O'Hare? Athiests should have equal time. What about Buddhists? Hindus? Shinto? Rastafarian? The Flying Spaghetti Monster? Hey, they all have agendas too!

So the next Pumpkin Spice, half-decaf, non-fat latte I order I will have to bow my head because some people have

nothing better to do...

how convenient...

With all of the crap that is being thrown at this administration, the New York Times headline is "New York Named in Terror Threat Against Subways." Seems so predetermined given Bush/Cheney/Rove have always deflected criticism using this tactic. The scary part is you don't know whether to believe it or not. It like the old children's story about the the boy who cried wolf. People didn't believe him eventually because they thought he was still pretending. Just like in the story, people's lives are at stake. It's difficult to know what to believe and when any more.

wolf, wolf, wolf...

something better to do...

An article in the mrzine [Monthly Review ezine] has an article, "Neo-Paleyism’s Assault on Reason," by Richard York, that has a very interesting thought on intelligent design that puts a hole into the argument itself.

Supporters of this movement are not deterred by the demonstrated power of natural selection to craft organisms finely attuned to their environments or by the rather obvious point that by renouncing material causes, they have created an infinite regress of explanation – i.e., surely the existence of an intelligent designer requires an even more extraordinary explanation than the existence of an object that appears to have been intelligently designed, so, if we are to follow the "logic" of intelligent design, we must invoke a designer of the designer, and so forth ad infinitum.

Wouldn't it be interesting if we were nothing more than an experiment being performed in a lab by an "intelligent designer" scientist who also is an experiment in a lab by another "intelligent designer" who is in a lab in an experiment by another "intelligent designer...?"

just asking...

and cronies...

Everyone is posting on the nomination of Bush's chief counsel, Harriet Miers, as the replacement for Justice O'Connor. Most of the blogs refer to her nomination as "cronyism." Living in Chicagoland all of my life, I'm used to this as a daily occurrence. However, except for the Chicago Sun-Times, it's not thought to be anything really bad. It's the way things are.

There has long been a tradition of "taking care of family" in Chicago and I don't think that anyone would really be opposed to taking care of "family" before anyone else. It's just that here, in Chicago, it is a large extended family. It includes and encompasses more and more people than the traditional family. It is also a hotbed of diversity. It has extended itself to all races, ethnic groups, sexual orientation groups, corporations, etc. Any entity that lends itself to the fostering of the family "tradition" is welcome and the main focus of this family is the continued existence of itself.

There are many people in Chicago who are against this type of governmental set-up. There are legitimate reasons for it to continue and other reasons to place it under control. One thing that can definitely be said for it is that it works. Anyone who has visited Chicago remarks about how beautiful the city is, how friendly the people are and how well taken care of the city is. I even get these comments in my visits to Paris when people find out I'm from Chicago.

So, if Mr. Bush is taking care of his "family," it is a way of taking care of the continued existence of the "family." In a way, it is survival of the fittest.

Yeah, right..., but what about family that lives in New Orleans and Mississippi or that is in Iraq and Afghanistan or is elderly or is approaching retirement age or is in need of medication or is put out of their homes because of their race or sexual orientation or is needing help finding a job or....

...enough said.

heroes, heroism, humanism..., continued...

Andrew Sullinvan is asking for people to lend their support to Capt. Ian Fishback by emailing supportfishback.@aol.com

I am especially impressed with Andrew's stand for integrity. I believe that integrity is being what I say and saying what I stand for. Capt. Fishback has certainly done this. Drop him an email and show your support. The United States must get back on the high road. For two centuries the U.S. was its word and its stand for freedom and the rights of all people. This administration has tainted our word and brought our integrity into question.

Lend your support in the quest to recreate our integrity.

heroes, heroism, humanism...

Andrew Sullivan has been following the saga of Capt. Ian Fishback who has spent a lot of time "researching" the Armed Forces policies of humane and inhumane treatment of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan. Capt. Fishback has written a letter printed in the Washington Post to Sen. John McCain asking for his assistance in assuring the honor and reputation of the United States' Armed Forces in the world from alleged disregard of the Geneva Conventions and treatment of prisoners as less than human beings by codifying the standards of treatment. In Captain Fishback's own words, "Once again, I strongly urge you to do justice to your men and women in uniform. Give them clear standards of conduct that reflect the ideals they risk their lives for." washingtonpost.com

He is reported as a totally upstanding member of the Army, a top-notch West Pointer and a caring individual both towards the soldiers under his command and foes. One co-worker, friend and acquaintance after another has attested to his solid background and actions.

The torture end-game is approaching - and Rumsfeld and Cheney know it. What is now being done to the hero, Captain Ian Fishback, who braved 17 months of obstruction, threats and intimidation by military brass to keep quiet, is a national disgrace. Fishback has now been sequestered at Fort Bragg under orders restricting his contacts (the pretext is that he is a key witness in a criminal investigation and that he should not be in contact with outsiders while it continues). My sources tell me that he has been subjected to a series of long, arduous interrogations by CID investigators. Predictably, the CID guys are out to find just one thing: they want to know the identities of his two or three NCO corroborators. Andrew Sullivan

This alleged treatment of Fishback is in keeping with how the current administration has handled instance after instance, not only with Iraq but with domestic and other diplomatic issues. It is concurrent with the secrecy built into the Homeland Security Law under the guise of national security.

...but what else is being kept secret?