Brokeback Mountain Forum @ ennisjack.com
The Movie & Story => Characters, Quotes & Scenes => Topic started by: jerasjr on Feb 22, 2006, 04:29 PM
-
Someone posted somewhere else that BBM started with Ennis and a paper bag, and basically ended with him and a brown paper bag (at Jack's parents). I didn't catch what they thought the significance was. To me it said that Ennis started with little- enough to fit in a paper bag and that he ended with little - the memory of Jack's love in the tightly wrapped shirts. Someone else has suggested that Jack's mother may have given Jack's ashes to Ennis also at that time, but am not sure of that.
-
Someone posted somewhere else that BBM . . . ended with him and a brown paper bag (at Jack's parents). I didn't catch what they thought the significance was.
I posted somewhere that Ennis left Jack's parents' with the shirts in a plain brown wrapper, alluding to Ennis's remaining in the closet.
I think somebody else said it was a feed bag that blew under Ennis's truck at the beginning, but I don't know what to make of that.
-
Ennis is standing next to the trailer waiting for Aguirre...there is a much folded paper bag on the step that he has placed there. Jack's mother takes a paper bag from the counter for Ennis to carry the shirts in. The paper bag post was not on this site.
-
Ennis is standing next to the trailer waiting for Aguirre...there is a much folded paper bag on the step that he has placed there.
I do remember the paper bag on the step of the trailer. It probably contained the shirt that Ennis took away from Jack's parents' house.
These bags would be a kind of metaphor of alpha and omega, the beginning and the end.
-
I do remember the paper bag on the step of the trailer. It probably contained the shirt that Ennis took away from Jack's parents' house.
These bags would be a kind of metaphor of alpha and omega, the beginning and the end.
I think so too. The paper bags definitely seem to be signaling a beginning and end:
Beginning of movie: As Ennis arrives in Signal, he steps out of the truck holding a paper sack containing all his possessions (a change of clothes) for the summer.
End of movie (before the epilog w/Alma Jr.): Ennis leaves the Twist house with a paper sack containing the shirts, all that he has left of Jack.
Another repeating theme (which is not mentioned in the screenplay) is how the opening scene of the distant truck traveling on the highway is later echoed by the shot of Ennis's truck leaving the Twist house. (In the screenplay Ennis is supposed to be driving down the dirt road away from the Twist house, not driving down the highway) Also in the opening scene it is early morning, and in the later scene, it is early evening. I only noticed these subtle touches on repeated viewings, but once you notice them they really add to the power of the film.
Besides the paper sack I've noticed other similar beginning/ending themes in the movie, just can't think of any at the moment, darn...
-
The paper bags definitely seem to be signaling a beginning and end:
Hadn't quite thought of it that way, but it does make sense. Had thought more along the lines that Ennis appears wtih his possessions, meager as they are, in a much used paper bag (and I can't imagine that he would have had much more considering his history). Throughout the story his life becomes more full. Yet at the end he is left with another paper bag containing the memories of Jack.
-
Another repeating theme (which is not mentioned in the screenplay) is how the opening scene of the distant truck traveling on the highway is later echoed by the shot of Ennis's truck leaving the Twist house.
I read somewhere, maybe IMDb-board, that they filmed the scenes on the same day and on the same road.
-
Book ends...
-
Book ends...
Now, I get it Frog123 . . . those things on a bookshelf at either end of the books. The bags frame the story of BBM.
-
Book ends...
Now, I get it Frog123 . . . those things on a bookshelf at either end of the books. The bags frame the story of BBM.
yep..that's how I saw it.
-
Someone posted somewhere else that BBM started with Ennis and a paper bag, and basically ended with him and a brown paper bag (at Jack's parents). I didn't catch what they thought the significance was. To me it said that Ennis started with little- enough to fit in a paper bag and that he ended with little - the memory of Jack's love in the tightly wrapped shirts. Someone else has suggested that Jack's mother may have given Jack's ashes to Ennis also at that time, but am not sure of that.
Oh. My. God.
I haven't noticed that.
This Ang Lee is a genious. The more I think of the film the more I see how "chinese" it is. Less is more...
//Jak-ish girl
-
check out the scene again you will notice right behind Jack's mother is a small collection of paper bags folded flat and leaning up against the cupboard wall. Obviously they are put there, like in many households right after the groceries are put away, to be used later.
I think in this case a grocery bag is just a grocery bag.
-
Yeah I don't think there were ashes involved.
-
I agree with RAB and Toadily, no ashes involved.
-
I've been thinking about the brown paperbags dutign a couple of days and I absolutely think there is a point. At the beginning tje bag is catched by the wind and if it wasn't caught by the wind it wouldn't have been pointed out. And I mean, to have the symbolic och the two shirts in the CLOSET. I mean OF COURSE there is a meaning with the brown paper bag.
When Ennis was around 20, all he had was a small bag, not more than 24 dollars and he had this paperbag...then, 20 ys later, he lives in a trailer and in his brown paperbag he has the "remains" of the love of his life. Very moving..
//Miss Nice
-
This is a really brilliant point--I hadn't thought of it that way before, but of course the bags are bookends. Just as the shirts are--the story notes that Ennis has his extra shirt in the bag at the beginning, perhaps the very same shirt that's in there again at the end (?). Sigh . . . .
Note also the driving scenes at the beginning and end (I think someone noted that elsewhere on this board): the first scene is the truck in which Ennis is riding driving right to left across the screen, and then we see Alma Jr's car approach from left to right at the end. Driving into the story, and driving out again. Although Ennis himself is left there at the end--he drove in and is staying there, with Jack, finally. ("Jack, I swear . . . ") :'(
-
check out the scene again you will notice right behind Jack's mother is a small collection of paper bags folded flat and leaning up against the cupboard wall. Obviously they are put there, like in many households right after the groceries are put away, to be used later.
I think in this case a grocery bag is just a grocery bag.
Absolutely! you are right. I lived in an old farmhouse first eleven years I was married, and was in a lot of them throughout HS/collge too---EVERY farm wife I knew (myself included when the time came) had brown paper bags, (as this was pretty much before plastic) stacked or squeezed in somewhere in the kitchen. one of my friends had hers like Jack's mom did, kinda stood up between a canister and the wall. I had my stacked between a broom closet and the wall--sometimes you had stacks of 20 or more, sometimes 2 or 3--depends on who needed what when, and you grab a bag, pack some stuff and one more is gone. You NEVER threw away any paper sack--you never knew when you needed to take something along.