I've Been Saying For a While . . .

Cowboys in Love

Posted by Lakshmi Chaudhry at 9:43 AM on December 14, 2005.

Brokeback Mountain is both a "gay cowboy movie" and an epic love story.

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Here's a quick web column I penned over the weekend on Brokeback Mountain. My thesis: The movie is an epic love story in the most traditional sense of the word. Think Romeo and Juliet, Tristan and Iseult. For love is only as immense as the barriers it overcomes:

For straight folks, those barriers have long been eroded in the name of progress. The 20th century democratized marriage, tossing aside considerations of class, race, family affiliations. It also tore down the centuries-old separation of love and marriage, making wedlock the natural and desired objective of heterosexual passion. ... The same custodians of social order who once tore asunder young men and women in love now nag them to “find someone and settle down." [In These Times]

So in a sense, only a "gay cowboy movie" set in Wyoming can meet the literary requirements of grand passion in 21st century America.

Lakshmi Chaudhry is a senior editor at In These Times, and the former senior editor of AlterNet. You can write to her at lakshmi@alternet.org.

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I've Been Saying For a While . . . [Report this comment] Posted by: Berea on Dec 14, 2005 11:44 AM Current rating: Not yet rated [1 = poor; 5 = excellent] . . . how Lesbian/Gay relationships are the Romeo and Juliet stories of our times. Pointing that universal out to some of my homophobic acquaintances has helped them begin to look at their part in the larger problem of homophobia. Perhaps BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN will help. I don't know. I don't plan to see it because it seems too sappy for me. (I stay away from sappy Hetero films as well.) But lots of my friends have been, well, the best word is 'thankful' that such a film has been made and released in the multiplexes. [« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

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