Brokeback Mountain Forum @ ennisjack.com
The Movie & Story => AP Short Story & Screenplay => Topic started by: Gunsgoinoff on Feb 02, 2006, 03:40 AM
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Hello all,
"Guns goin' off", then out, down and asleep.
A friend and I had an hour long conversation about this sentence. This is a line from the story that may just be the most incredible sentence I have read in the past 20 years. And here's why. First, if you haven't read the story, let me put it in context. This is during and after the first time Ennis and Jack have sex. The quote in the sentence is spoken by Ennis to Jack. With these 8 words, Annie Proulx has done what we as Gay people have tried to do for a long time. That is to show that sex and homosexuality is as natural as breathing. It also speaks volumes about Jack and Ennis' relationship. I feel that Proulx's writing in this story is a revolution! To use such few words and have them SCREAM at you, is brilliant. If you haven't read the story, please do. But read every word carefully, or you could miss something that means the world to Ennis and Jack.
-Chris
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Chris, :)
I mentioned to friends with whom I saw the movie about that line and its context in the short story. They said they were glad it wasn't in the film and seemed to think it was kind of "icky". I personally loved it.
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just to point it out (please correct me if I'm wrong) that the quote is spoken by Jack...
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... and Jack's choked "gun's going off," then out, down and asleep.
"
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It is an example of some of AP's powerful writing imagery. Like certain other dialog that is in the story it was omitted from the movie as either unnecessary or evocative of an undesired response. In this particular case audiences may have found the line humorous, incongruous with the scene. She can in a couple words say what pages and pages of scripts, sets, sounds, and actors take weeks to achieve. As Chris recommends, read carsfully. I've read it at least fifty times and I'm still coming to realizations that are new to me.
Jim
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I've read it at least fifty times and I'm still coming to realizations that are new to me.
Jim
50?
I know it's very short, but 50!
Wow!
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No doubt! It's open on my desktop (behind this very page) even now.
I refer to it several time a day. I've renamed it "Ennis loves Jack"
Jim
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Jimnick! I know this is off topic (so I hope I don't get in trouble) -- but since you are so familiar with the story - do you know what:
"the submarine Thresher lost two months earlier with all hands and how it must have been in the last doomed minutes" i
is referring to???? It's starting to bug me!
kcristob
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Jimnick! I know this is off topic (so I hope I don't get in trouble) -- but since you are so familiar with the story - do you know what:
"the submarine Thresher lost two months earlier with all hands and how it must have been in the last doomed minutes" i
is referring to???? It's starting to bug me!
kcristob
Well first to say I am no authority on the subject.
I believe the line you are referring to takes place when the boys are making small talk at the campsite. Basically saying anything to keep from saying good night. The submarine Thresher was a current events news story of the time and just something to talk about. This conversation took place before they first made love, and I think, it is a prelude, getting to know one another better conversation, the substance of which is less important than the occurrence.
About the Thresher: On April 10, 1963, the USS Thresher, the lead ship of a new class of nuclear-powered attack submarines, was conducting sea trials off the coast of New England with another ship, the USS Skylark (ASR-20). The two ships were in communication by means of underwater sound telephone. At 0747 the USS Thresher started a deep dive. Everything was fine until 0913. At this time the USS Thresher sent this message. "We are experiencing minor difficulties, we have a positive up angle, and are attempting to blow. Will keep you informed". At 0916 & 0917 respectively, the USS Skylark received two garbled messages followed shortly by SONAR detection of a high energy, low frequency disturbance. This disturbance was the crushing of the USS Thresher as it had fallen below crush depth. One hundred twenty nine men had perished, including crew members, PNSY Officer Observers, PNSY civilian workers and contractor technicians.
And, you're not off topic at all. This is where we discuss the the differences between the pages of the story and the movie interpretation. I hope this helps.
Thanks,
Jim
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Excellent! I couldn't find the thresher story online - but can now. I knew it had to refer to a real news story, but wasn't sure what!
After your post about referring to it all the time, I had to bring mine up and read it again - which prompted my question.
Brilliant story - thanks for the illumination
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de nada!
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I've read it at least fifty times and I'm still coming to realizations that are new to me.
Jim
50?
I know it's very short, but 50!
Wow!
Well I have probably read it more than 50 times myself...sometimes I just read the last 5 pages...sometimes the whole thing...mainly on my way to and from work...listening to The Wings!
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I don't think it just a topical time reference. As noted, all the crew members perished when they reached "crush depth" ie crushed by external force on the submarine. In the story, Jack and Ennis discuss what the crew's final moments must have been like. When the time comes for them to come off the mountain, Annie says: As they descended the slope, Ennis felt he was in a slow-motion, but headlong irreversible fall." And our heroes are later crushed by external forces, no? Their everyday world is "crush depth" for their relationship.
Thanks, Jim for the details on this event. I remembered it from childhood, but only vaguely. I was struck when I saw the reference in the story, as I don't think I have heard it mentioned at all in the intervening years.
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Oops, I meant it was said by Jack.
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I don't think it just a topical time reference. As noted, all the crew members perished when they reached "crush depth" ie crushed by external force on the submarine. In the story, Jack and Ennis discuss what the crew's final moments must have been like. When the time comes for them to come off the mountain, Annie says: As they descended the slope, Ennis felt he was in a slow-motion, but headlong irreversible fall." And our heroes are later crushed by external forces, no? Their everyday world is "crush depth" for their relationship.
Thanks, Jim for the details on this event. I remembered it from childhood, but only vaguely. I was struck when I saw the reference in the story, as I don't think I have heard it mentioned at all in the intervening years.
Thanks for the very perceptive comment, Proulxfan! I think the idea of linking it with the "headlong irreversible fall" (what a brilliant phrase!) is great. Maybe we could take a look at how that headlong irreversible fall is being shown in the movie? The way Ennis sits, lonely and apart, before he is lassoed by Jack when they have to go. Or how he doesn't really answer Jack, when asked if he will come back... And then, of course, the way he hits the wall of the shed while retching. Definitely, something irreversible has happened there.
monicita
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In the story, after the boys reunite @ the motel, Ennis asks Jack, "You do it w. other guys?" "Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own."
What's "not rolling his own?" I understand the bulls part but not the latter.
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well, it's a euphanism for pleasuring one's self.. in reference to Ennis saying he had ' hunnerd times'...
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Ah, I get it. How naive of me. Thank you. ;)
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It seems to me the dialogue in the motel room opens narrowly the possibility for Ennis to have different decision about their relation:
“Old Brokeback got us good and it sure ain't over. We got a work out what the f*ck we're goin a do now." says Jack
Ennis’s answer is
"That summer," said Ennis. "When we split up after we got paid out I had gut cramps so bad I pulled over and tried to puke, thought I ate somethin bad at that place in Dubois. Took me. about a year a figure out it was that I shouldn't a let you out a my sights.Too late then by a long, long while."
Too late for what?
and:
“Two guys livin together? No. All I can see is we get together once in a while way the hell out in the back a nowhere -- "
"How much is once in a while?" said Jack. "Once in a while ever four f*ckin years?"
"No," said Ennis, forbearing to ask whose fault that was. "
The same dialogue at the end of Brokeback time, I think Ennis wouldn’t have been so stiff in his decision of “ Two guys livin together? No.”
Also the story about Ennis's brother K.E. slugging him badly till the father pushes him to react sounds like a metaphor of their relationship: father/ Jack, lack of reaction: to face K.E./to face forbidden love.
Ennis needs the right person to push him to the right decision. It happens with his brother, not with Jack.
I had this feeling reading the book only... maybe cuz I hardly accept the end of the story >:(
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just to point it out (please correct me if I'm wrong) that the quote is spoken by Jack...
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... and Jack's choked "gun's going off," then out, down and asleep.
"
It is what Jack said at the height of his orgasm. ::)
IMO, it was un-necessarily left out of the screen play. It would have had no effect on the film's rating nor turn it into a gay porn scene. Not including it made this scene appear more "animalistic" instead of 2 men experiencing pleasure. Overall, that may have been Anne's intent but she included the "gun's goin' off" to make it more human and show that not only Ennis was having all the fun. ::)
It was 1 of several disappointments I experienced as a result of having read the short story before seeing the movie. Still, it is an excellent film and I will purchase the DVD.
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I had forgotten about the reference to the USS Thresher in the short story. A tragic loss of 129 men - navy and civilian technicians. It went below its dive depth and was crushed.
"A few items from the submarine were later found floating in the vicinity of where the submarine sank—these having surfaced when the hull was crushed under the intense water pressure. The remains of the submarine were eventually located by the deep-submergence vehicle Trieste II, in 8,400 feet, where the pressure exceeds 1,000 pounds per square inch. The submarine's loss was attributed to a failure of the saltwater induction system, which resulted in flooding of the engine room."
B&W pictures:
http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/sh-usn/usnsh-t/ssn593-l.htm
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A coupla things about the Thresher incident:
A descent into a place from which you suddenly find you can't return.
Sometimes you get to a place where there's no turning back.
Especially since J & E had talked about "how those last minutes" would have been to the crew, there is a parallel to the upcoming FNIT. -- Men who are put together not entirely of their own choosing, and suddenly find themselves in a tight, enclosed area under desperate circumstances.
Obviously, in a situation like the Thresher, there would be a sense of a deep, permanent connection, a sharing in the essence of things.
What would it have been like? In addition to fear, panic, despair, there would have been embraces, comfort, prayers, bravery.
I don't need to make all the parallels, I guess.
Hell, that's more words than I've spoken all year.
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The Thresher reference also seems to have an "out of one's depth" resonance with what's happening, at least to Ennis.
Another differnce between the story and the movie is that Ennis starts off in the tent in the short story, just has to be presuaded into Jack's bed-roll. I think the movie version where he starts off outside is better, showing Ennis's macho stubbornness and maybe his unconscious desire to keep his distance from Jack?
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I find it interestingly odd that so many people prefer the revised movie story to the original short story.
Sometimes it is like the screenplay writers and the director seem to say, 'Oh, Annie Proulx, I like your story but I can write it/tell it better than you can."
I have seen movies "adapted from an orignal novel or short story" and about the only thing in common that the movie and the story had was the title and sometimes the names of the main characters had the same names.
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In the story, after the boys reunite @ the motel, Ennis asks Jack, "You do it w. other guys?" "Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own."
What's "not rolling his own?" I understand the bulls part but not the latter.
I always took it to mean literally, "rolling his own cigarettes," but it's clearly a euphemism for masturbation.
(Ennis) "I never had no thoughts a doin it with another guy except I sure wrang it out a hunderd times thinkin about you. You do it with other guys? Jack?"
"Shit no," said Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own. "You know that."
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In the story, after the boys reunite @ the motel, Ennis asks Jack, "You do it w. other guys?" "Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own."
What's "not rolling his own?" I understand the bulls part but not the latter.
I always took it to mean literally, "rolling his own cigarettes," but it's clearly a euphemism for masturbation.
(Ennis) "I never had no thoughts a doin it with another guy except I sure wrang it out a hunderd times thinkin about you. You do it with other guys? Jack?"
"Shit no," said Jack, who had been riding more than bulls, not rolling his own. "You know that."
i always knew when i read that parragraph that Jack was not being so good boy he certainly ride more than bulls and we are not talking about lureen and we see that in the movie on the clown see but if i don't know or maybe i'm wrong but a friends says that the bar man of that scene tried to flirst jack ¬_¬ really don't know what to say on that.
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I find it interestingly odd that so many people prefer the revised movie story to the original short story.
Sometimes it is like the screenplay writers and the director seem to say, 'Oh, Annie Proulx, I like your story but I can write it/tell it better than you can."
I have seen movies "adapted from an orignal novel or short story" and about the only thing in common that the movie and the story had was the title and sometimes the names of the main characters had the same names.
I too find that odd. I have seen some people say they think the film is much more powerful than the short story, but I don't find that to be true at all. In terms of their respective impacts on me, I would say they pack equal, though qualitatively different, wallops. And I think this film adaptation sets an admirable standard for others to follow in terms of its faithfulness to the original, and Ms. Proulx's public statements would indicate she feels the same way. (And to try to stay on topic for a change, I don't hear the line "g.g.o" in the first tent scene, though I can't say I really miss it.)
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I don't think it just a topical time reference. As noted, all the crew members perished when they reached "crush depth" ie crushed by external force on the submarine. In the story, Jack and Ennis discuss what the crew's final moments must have been like. When the time comes for them to come off the mountain, Annie says: As they descended the slope, Ennis felt he was in a slow-motion, but headlong irreversible fall." And our heroes are later crushed by external forces, no? Their everyday world is "crush depth" for their relationship.
Thanks, Jim for the details on this event. I remembered it from childhood, but only vaguely. I was struck when I saw the reference in the story, as I don't think I have heard it mentioned at all in the intervening years.
Proulxfan, I just read this thread after all these weeks! I,too, vaguely recall the news event about the Thresher, and your insights here are wonderful; another reminder of the "depths" that Annie Proulx's concentrated, distilled writing can take us. There are so many wonderful lines that didn't make it into the screen play, and many great lines in the screen play that are original.....I think the Thresher line works in print, but would not have worked in the film.
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I don't think it just a topical time reference. As noted, all the crew members perished when they reached "crush depth" ie crushed by external force on the submarine. In the story, Jack and Ennis discuss what the crew's final moments must have been like. When the time comes for them to come off the mountain, Annie says: As they descended the slope, Ennis felt he was in a slow-motion, but headlong irreversible fall." And our heroes are later crushed by external forces, no? Their everyday world is "crush depth" for their relationship.
Thanks, Jim for the details on this event. I remembered it from childhood, but only vaguely. I was struck when I saw the reference in the story, as I don't think I have heard it mentioned at all in the intervening years.
Proulxfan, I just read this thread after all these weeks! I,too, vaguely recall the news event about the Thresher, and your insights here are wonderful; another reminder of the "depths" that Annie Proulx's concentrated, distilled writing can take us. There are so many wonderful lines that didn't make it into the screen play, and many great lines in the screen play that are original.....I think the Thresher line works in print, but would not have worked in the film.
Wow, guys thanks for that insight. that was great.
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I was also disappointed that some of the lines from the story did not make it into the movie - especially the "g.g.o" from FNIT and the "little darlin'" from the Reunion scene. It seemed in the story that Ennis was just so much more verbal in his love for Jack, and I at least felt better for Jack - because in the book he had verbal confirmaton that Ennis cared for him and thought of him while they were apart.
However, I can understand that for Annie Proulx the only way she could convey Ennis' emotion and thoughts was through the written word. Whereas, in the movie the actors, set, lighting, music -- all of it can come together to convey thoughts, mood, etc. In another thread someone posted Ennis' little head nudge during the reunion scene was his "little darlin". I read that, and thought, "Yes! Okay, I don't feel so bad about missing that line, now." I think, although both the story and movie can enhance our understanding of this love story, they need to stand alone as separate works of art.
As for the discussion about the Thresher, I remember thinking how brilliant of Proulx to have them talking about, not just a current event item, but also analyzing it - expressing their opinion to each other. It creates a level of intimacy and trust. For anyone that's ever been camping, it just brings up that image of sitting by the campfire, watching the flames illuminate each other's faces, listening to the crickets, surrounded by dark sky and stars and that awesome feeling like you're the only two people in the whole world. The quiet tone of the other person's voice because you don't want the sound to carry, and the feeling like you can talk about anything and BE anything. I never read more into it than that but I appreciate the insights expressed -- more to think about.
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wow that is a really great line