'He was a friend of mine'

Some critics presented Brokeback Mountain as "a gay western". Well, I’m afraid this film is not a western. Brokeback Mountain is a love story. There are scenic landscapes, boots and jeans trousers, a bit of rodeo… the whole package for a good western movie, that’s true. But, the western bit is just a background to this beautiful film. What Ang Lee portrays here is a love story. A love story between two guys, right, but a love story all the same.

Some critics said that Heath Ledger was overplaying, and that his fake accent was ridiculous. That’s what I read somewhere. Once again, I don't agree with that point of view. I think this actor is outstanding in that role. He plays a rough guy, although his performance is all in restraint. The same cannot be said about Jake Gyllenhaal. He’s a good actor, for sure, but I wasn’t as mesmerized by his part as I was by Heath Ledger.

Until last year, some people though the novel by Annie Proulx (published in the New Yorker in 1999) was impossible to adapt for the cinema. Ang Lee made them wrong. He provides us a stunning movie. He develops the psychology of the two main characters over 20 years, he makes them grow, he films them clogging into the society’s outlaws. He captures the consequences of an impossible love with talent.

+ To go further : the film's website