From the land of the self-absorbed comes this astonishing statement by Andrew Sullivan:
but the idea that a movie with bareback gay sex in it would have been this successful even five years ago seems unlikely to me. That bareback sex would be a way of revealing deeper love is even more astonishing.
Look, I am truly sorry that Sullivan made a mistake and got infected with HIV -- even now, it's not an easy thing to live with and I've lost as many men I loved as anyone else, I guess, but we can't rewrite history because of it. I can only echo cabanaboyscoot: Movie begins in 1963. Movie ends around 1983. Two kids in Wyoming who have no idea that they will be having sex and are not really in a position to saunter over to the local Walgreen's. Get it?
Sophos has also been blogging the film recently. Check this one out, and then scroll down.
The wildmons are in complete denial on Brokeback, still clinging to "it's going to be a box-office flop." Sorry, boys, but it's been playing in some red states, and doing quite well because it's an excellent film with a universal theme.
By the way, Annie Proulx says it's not about cowboys, and I have to agree with her to a certain extent: it's not, as conceived, a "Western" in the classic sense, nor are Ennis and Jack what we normally think of as "cowboys." However, I still stand by my statements in the Green Man Review piece that the cowboy archetype is fundamentally important to the film, both in Ennis' character and in the depth of the film itself. They're not iconic "cowboys," but they are real cowboys, Ennis even more so than Jack. It's the reality of that icon that makes it work.
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Sullivan's statement becomes even more astonishing when we reflect on the fact that a couple of years ago he was revealed to be advertising for bareback partners on at least one Web-based hookup site at a time when he knew he was HIV positive, and claimed persecuted-victim status when this was widely reported and excoriated. Has someone been teaching him that he *is* his brother's keeper? Or is he just too young to remember gay sex in 1963?
As I may have mentioned before, Sullivan tends to get caught up in irrelevancies, and also tends to be horribly self-referential. I'm not the only one who's noticed this -- the "it didn't exist until I discovered it" mentality. As it is, I found that comment bizarre even for him.
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