Positive and Negative Attention for Brokeback Mountain
Brokeback Mountain won two more awards last night at the 11th annual Critics Choice Awards, voted on by broadcast film critics....Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress for Michelle Williams. Brokeback Mountain has already been awarded best picture by the New York and Los Angeles film critics associations, and it heads into next Monday's Golden Globes with a leading seven nominations. I don't even have to mention the Oscar buzz.
Unfortunately, it can't generate all of this positive attention without being subject to some negative attention as well. Last week the movie mysteriously disappeared from Salt Lake City's Megaplex 17, even though the ads ran in Salt Lake City's two major newspapers. The theater is owned by Larry H. Miller, a prominent Mormon businessman. The manger of the Megaplex refused to say why the film had been cancelled, but it is widely known that it has been under attack in Utah by the Mormon Church, so it would be natural to assume that this religious stance had something to do with the ban. The Utah Eagle Forum, a conservative group that backed the state's constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and regularly fights other LGBT issues praised the decision not to run the film (365gay.com). Brokeback Mountain has also been pulled from a theater in Washington.
I love Heath Ledger's response to the news. He compares the cancellation of the film to racism, and adds, "Personally, I don't think the movie is controversial. I think it's very immature of a society. If two people are loving . . . I think we should be more concerned if two people express anger in love, than love."
It's too bad that some religious organizations can't agree. But it's refreshing to realize that the purity of love remains despite human attempts to ruin it. It's metaphorical really. The characters in Brokeback Mountain became boxed in by the culture that immediately surrounded them, and now the movie itself is being subject to the same type of limitation in some areas. Yet its power remains. Organizations may condemn the movie in the name of religion, but it's comforting to know that the objective critics who make no attempt to channel love, and make judgments based upon the merit of the story, realize that there is purity in gay relationships. Here's to much continued success...
Unfortunately, it can't generate all of this positive attention without being subject to some negative attention as well. Last week the movie mysteriously disappeared from Salt Lake City's Megaplex 17, even though the ads ran in Salt Lake City's two major newspapers. The theater is owned by Larry H. Miller, a prominent Mormon businessman. The manger of the Megaplex refused to say why the film had been cancelled, but it is widely known that it has been under attack in Utah by the Mormon Church, so it would be natural to assume that this religious stance had something to do with the ban. The Utah Eagle Forum, a conservative group that backed the state's constitutional amendment banning gay marriage and regularly fights other LGBT issues praised the decision not to run the film (365gay.com). Brokeback Mountain has also been pulled from a theater in Washington.
I love Heath Ledger's response to the news. He compares the cancellation of the film to racism, and adds, "Personally, I don't think the movie is controversial. I think it's very immature of a society. If two people are loving . . . I think we should be more concerned if two people express anger in love, than love."
It's too bad that some religious organizations can't agree. But it's refreshing to realize that the purity of love remains despite human attempts to ruin it. It's metaphorical really. The characters in Brokeback Mountain became boxed in by the culture that immediately surrounded them, and now the movie itself is being subject to the same type of limitation in some areas. Yet its power remains. Organizations may condemn the movie in the name of religion, but it's comforting to know that the objective critics who make no attempt to channel love, and make judgments based upon the merit of the story, realize that there is purity in gay relationships. Here's to much continued success...
posted by Jen Austin at 1:46 PM
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