Brokeback Mountain Forum @ ennisjack.com
The Movie & Story => Characters, Quotes & Scenes => Topic started by: browneyes on Aug 07, 2006, 06:07 PM
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I've been to other boards (and this one) and a lot of people think that Jack and Randall did make it up to Lightning Flat. Are these people just not paying attention? Ang Lee confirmed it was May of 83 the last time Ennis and Jack was last together (in an interview). Some person thought after the last meeting, that Jack and Randall immediately became closer. Even though Jack didn't go back to Texas right away. And some people don't know that May is in Spring. So doesn't it make since that Jack talked about the "other fella" to his Dad right away leaving Ennis. And Jack's Dad doesn't say that "they're gonna split up with their wives", he says "Jack is gonna split up with his wife". To me that indicates that Randall didn't know of Jack's plan to live together. And if Jack and Randall were so close, as some claim they were how come Jack didn't tell his Dad what the "other fella's" name was? Jack told his Dad who Ennis was and his name. And why do people think Randall made it back to Lightning Flat even though it's totally obvious he never did. John Twist told Ennis that himself. And if Jack and Randall were really close how come Jack kept the shirts?
It just makes me mad how all these self-appointed "experts" don't pay close attention to the movie.
That's all :)
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I've been to other boards (and this one) and a lot of people think that Jack and Randall did make it up to Lightning Flat. Are these people just not paying attention? Ang Lee confirmed it was May of 83 the last time Ennis and Jack was last together (in an interview). Some person thought after the last meeting, that Jack and Randall immediately became closer. Even though Jack didn't go back to Texas right away. And some people don't know that May is in Spring. So doesn't it make since that Jack talked about the "other fella" to his Dad right away leaving Ennis. And Jack's Dad doesn't say that "they're gonna split up with their wives", he says "Jack is gonna split up with his wife". To me that indicates that Randall didn't know of Jack's plan to live together. And if Jack and Randall were so close, as some claim they were how come Jack didn't tell his Dad what the "other fella's" name was? Jack told his Dad who Ennis was and his name. And why do people think Randall made it back to Lightning Flat even though it's totally obvious he never did. John Twist told Ennis that himself. And if Jack and Randall were really close how come Jack kept the shirts?
It just makes me mad how all these self-appointed "experts" don't pay close attention to the movie.
That's all :)
Browneyes, I just love your post. People can watch a movie more that 200 times and still find things they did not realize. And yet there are people who can watch a few dozen times and proclaim they are experts, or at least write as if they were.
It is obvious Randall never went to the Twist home. There wasn't time for one thing. Jack left Ennis and went to his parents home and there proclaimed he was going to bring Randall up there to help out. He then went back to Texas where he was killed a few months later.
As for the shirts, well, I suspect Jack would have kept them even if he and Randall had become lovers. Those shirts stood for an awful lot of love that still existed and to some degree, always would. You never forget your first.
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Tremendous post browneyes - I've never understood those who think that Randall actually did go up to Lightning Flat despite everything John Twist says.
As for the shirts, well, I suspect Jack would have kept them even if he and Randall had become lovers. Those shirts stood for an awful lot of love that still existed and to some degree, always would. You never forget your first.
Absolutely.
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Thank you for the praise of my post. It's just how can these so called "experts" claimed they've seen the movie a dozen times and still miss things as hard as they were to miss. All u gotta do is pay attention!
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Didn't Jack's dad even say, after talking about "this other fella", that just like most of Jack's schemes they didn't come to pass? That's just one more nail in the coffin to me that Randall never came with Jack to Wyoming.
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He did, dalemidex. He also didn't name the "other fella" - he was just "some ranch neighbour of his from Texas", whereas he knew Ennis' name. That, more than anything, says that Randall never went to Lightning Flat. If he had then at the very least, John Twist would have known his name.
Nope, Randall never went to Lightning Flat, and Jack never even told his parents his name. Doesn't sound like it was something he'd thought about very much at all, when you think about it like that.
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I'm comomg round to the idea that after that final parting with Ennis, Jack went up to Lightning flat in a desperate frame of mind. If John Twist had said anything about his plans, you know, taunting him - "When are you going to bring that Ennis Del Mar up here like you said?" - I can imagine Jack reacting and knowing that Ennis is would never be coming saying something about changing his mind and bringing a ranching neighbour, just to get his father off his back. I don't even think he meant it.
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Just love all these posts!
I've always thought that what Jack's dad said didn't mean anything. Jack often spoke first, thought after. He's just had a very emotional last meeting with Ennis. His emotions and moods must have been all over the place. He was 'thinking out loud'. The fact that Jack's dad knew that the other fella was a ranch neighbour from Texas though does imply that Jack probably did say it - but probably either to get at his dad like welshwitch said, or when he was feeling very pessimistic about his future with Ennis. IMO. Who knows if he ever said anything to Randall about it?. He used to say the same to his dad about Ennis moving there with him but he'd never told Ennis - at least we're never told that he had, and I for one doubt that he had. It was one of his dreams. Also I agree that if Jack's dad knew Randalls name he would have used it to hurt Ennis, he seems that type. He's saying the whole thing to hurt Ennis - why else bring it up? He's just trying to show Ennis what he suspects/knows without coming out and saying it outright, belittling Jack and being truly vile. I bet he was even disappointed in Jack for dying young. Are you surprised that this man decided against letting his own son even have the last say over his own resting place? Denying Jack his one last wish - denying Ennis the pride of carrying out that last wish? :X I'm not. Sadly.
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Thank you welshwitch - that's exactly what I think too.
Think about it. Jack has (probably) been seeing Randall for around five years by the time he has his final meeting with Ennis. But he didn't mention Randall to his folks until after that so there was no thought of moving up to Lightning Flat with Randall prior to the confrontation with Ennis. Now I know it could be that he really did mean it - that his realisation that Ennis was never going to come round led him to accept that he would have to build a life with someone else - but I think it's far more likely that he just blurted it out to get his father off his back. He would have been pretty low emotionally at that point and would definitely not have wanted to discuss Ennis so he diverts his father away from that subject by mentioning another man.
I'm also coming round to thinking that John Twist actually knew what Ennis meant to Jack and vice versa and says what he says out of cruelty, as a way of getting back at the son he can no longer bully. He sees the look on Ennis' face when he says that Jack used to talk about him - and immediately destroys even that small crumb of comfort by saying that Jack had spoken of another man.
Oops - I think that can of worms just got opened again ::)
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You are pretty good with that can opener, NoReins. ;) And I agree with what you and WelchWitch had to say on the subject.
Could it also have been, maybe, that Jack mentioned his rancher neighbour to his father after seeing Ennis that last time, partly because he was hurting and he just wanted to say something, anything, that would seem as if he had something going for the future?? Whistling in the dark sort of thing, not really intending it, but so tired for feeling hurt and hopeless, he creates a small bubble of "possiblity" for himself, so the time ahead doesn't seem as bleak at that moment? So he can have something positive to say to his Dad, and to make himself feel a little better, fend off the dark?
I have to agree with you all who doubt the Randall thing it would have gone any further than an off-hand mention by Jack to his Dad, with no real plan to make it happen for real.
And wouldn't put it pass dear ol' Dad to say something just for the sake of striking out at the man his son had spoken of often over the years.
There's a couple of worms for you, NoReins .... :)
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I wonder why John Twist says Jack had said he was going to leave his wife? As far as we know Jack hadn't raised that one with Lureen; it seems equally unlikley he'd suggested to Randall that they should more up to Lightning Flat together. It seems to me that if Jack had siad anything about any of this, it was because it had been in his mind after the last nmeeting with Ennis, because he was so distraught by what had happened that he just thought "Sod it" when his father was there sneering at him, as he sneers at Ennis. John Twist is a character with no apparent redeeming features ( except for having fathered Jack) and might even have worked the whole things out, putting together bits and pieces Jack had said, and come up with what he said to Ennis to try to hurt him and imply he knew all about them. He surely had some idea that Ennis meant something special to Jack; why else would he have appeared there?
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This is the first time I heard that someone mentioned about Randall moving to Lightning Flat with Jack. I don't think so. IMO, Randall NEVER been to LF with Jack. In fact, I don't think their relationship was really that close. I think they were just two men needing something from each other that they hardly never get from anyone else. And although Jack tried to quit Ennis, he will always love Ennis and that's why he kept those shirts. I think Ennis was his first and only true love.
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I made this post because you'd be surprised that quite a few people on this board and other really think that Randall and Jack made it to Lightning Flat. Some people even think after Jack and Ennis' last meeting him and Randall immediately became close (even though Jack didn't go straight back to Texas).
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There's been lots of speculation, some based on interpretations from what we seeing happening in the movie or ss, some requiring huge stretches of imagination and leaps of logic that are a little difficult for (me anyway) to follow ... I've seen a scenario suggested where Jack supposedly faked his death to get away from Lureen AND Ennis, and others have wondered if Jack's murder was arranged by Lureen or L.D. .... so, you have to go with whatever makes the most sense to you, I guess. BBM is a masterpiece because it allows room for the viewer to make up their own minds about some things; at times that might take some fans to places a lot of us can't easily follow. Enjoy your trip, I always say ... I'll just stay right here in my own personal comfort zone ... :)
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I agree with you, NoReins. John Twist is a mean, mean man. He could see ( couldn't we all?) how much Ennis was hurting sitting at that kitchen table holding tears back as best he could. I think the old man saw an opportunity to hurt Ennis. I do believe John knew exactly what Jack was and exactly what Ennis meant to him. Therefore, hurting Ennnis was the next best thing to hurting Jack, so he lied, or stretched the truth.
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I agree with you, NoReins. John Twist is a mean, mean man. He could see ( couldn't we all?) how much Ennis was hurting sitting at that kitchen table holding tears back as best he could. I think the old man saw an opportunity to hurt Ennis. I do believe John knew exactly what Jack was and exactly what Ennis meant to him. Therefore, hurting Ennnis was the next best thing to hurting Jack, so he lied, or stretched the truth.
It is no surprise that I do not subscribe to the statement that Mr. Twist was a mean man. For some reason in the short story what Mr. Twist says BEFORE he starts talking about Ennis and Randall have softened him in my eyes.
In the SS Mr. Twist angrily says, "I can't get no help out here." To me, this sets up everything else he says. Sounds to me that Jack kept promising to bring Ennis out to help run the ranch and later Randall. But, it never came to pass and Mr. Twist ended up having to run the ranch all by himself. Sounds to me like Mr. Twist was bitter, but not mean.
Jack didn't seem to think he was mean. Jack told him he was going to bring Ennis, then Randall home and they were going to build a cabin and live together. Sounds to me they had a pretty open relationship.
Was Mr. Twist a good father, probably not when you consider he couldn't get any help way out there in the middle of nowhere and that made him a bitter man and what he did to Jack as a child. But, all in all, I think Jack enjoyed an open relationship with his dad.
Jack did tell Ennis there was no pleasing his dad, but could it be Jack couldn't do anything right? We know he couldn't shoot, couldn't open a can of beans without getting it all over himself and any number of things he couldn't do as expressed in other threads. So, maybe Jack just said that to Ennis to save face. It wasn't his fault he was a screw-up, his dad was just one of those men you couldn't please.
As to your second remark about Mr. Twist lying or stretching the truth, what lie did he tell or how did he stretch the truth? All Mr. Twist said was that Jack was to bring Ennis up to the ranch to help run it. They were going to build a cabin together. Then he was going to bring Randall up there and divorce his wife. Where is the lie? To jack these were his dreams and I suspect he had every intention of doing them. He just didn't know how to make his dreams come true.
No, Mr.Twist wasn't a mean man in my opinion; just a bitter and tired old man.
*o) This is the third message I have posted in reply to one of yours lamusica. I am not picking on you, honest. Don't let me intimidate you. you just go right on posting...and I will go right on replying. :8
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Well, I think Jake's talking about another guy in front of his parents was only a reaction to the discussion our boys had when they met before. It was a mixture of defiance, frustration & helplessness because Jake was unable to get Ennis out of his mind...... he felt the urgent need to settle down with a man, but in fact he truly wanted to live with Ennis and nobody else
The texas rancher is only a meager substitute like the mexican rent boy years before..... these men are only there to illustrate Jake's gorgeous sexual appetite O0
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It's true Jack says he couldn't please his father whateve rhe did - this may have been because his father clearly criticized and found fault with everything he did so he became self-conscious and nervous; this then carried in to later life. Ennis in contrast was competent, and Randall appears to have been so too, and he had a college education " for what it's worth" - sorry - couldn't resist - my prejudices are showing). If Jack thought of bringing either to Lightning Flat it might have been as a means of demonstrating to his father that he had competent/accomplished friends who would provide a counterweight against his father.
He clearly siad he intended to bring first one then the other; he didn't bring Ennis because Ennis wouldn't come, and never had the chance to bring Randall, but the worst you can accuse him of in this is wishful thinking.
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I'm sorry to disagree with you, Patriot, but I cannot agree that Jack's dad was not a mean man. The manner in which he spoke; the fact that his wife would not say one word without looking at him to assess his mood; the fact that he never came to see Jack rodeo; the fact that he couldn't get help on the ranch ( Who wanted to work for him?) I think all these things point to a man who was bitterly disappointed in his son, but also in his life.
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I'm sorry to disagree with you, Patriot, but I cannot agree that Jack's dad was not a mean man. The manner in which he spoke; the fact that his wife would not say one word without looking at him to assess his mood; the fact that he never came to see Jack rodeo; the fact that he couldn't get help on the ranch ( Who wanted to work for him?) I think all these things point to a man who was bitterly disappointed in his son, but also in his life.
I certainly don't mind that you respond to my messges - favorably or unfavorably. You have your opinion and I have mine. You make a lot of good points, but I can't agree with you on this issue.
As far as Jack being incompetent: I'm not so sure he was such a complete incompetent as you indicate. He is silly and impetuous at times, but he worked for Lureen's father and obviously did a competent job there. He was a present father, if not a "good" one ( at least he cared about Bobby's schooling -- maybe because he was bit so well schooled himself); He could handle the sheep; he could ride horses/bulls with some competence. Oh, well. Let's agree to disagree on this issue, Patriot. (smile)
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I'm sorry to disagree with you, Patriot, but I cannot agree that Jack's dad was not a mean man. The manner in which he spoke; the fact that his wife would not say one word without looking at him to assess his mood; the fact that he never came to see Jack rodeo; the fact that he couldn't get help on the ranch ( Who wanted to work for him?) I think all these things point to a man who was bitterly disappointed in his son, but also in his life.
The manner in which Mr. Twist spoke was as a bitter old and tired man who was disappointed by his only son. I am sure Mr. Twist had expected his son to work the ranch with him and one day take over. Didn't happen.
If you are going to say he was mean because his wife wouldn't say anything, then you are going to have to accuse Ennis of being a mean man also because Alma wouldn't say anything either. Remember the scene in the grocery store? Remember the kiss she saw? Remember the note she put into Ennis' tackle box? For years she never said anything. Was Ennis a mean man also?
Mr. Twist never taught Jack how to rodeo and never went to see him rodeo because he didn't want Jack to leave the ranch and go rodeoing. He wanted him to stay with him on the ranch. Teaching him to rodeo and going to watch him would just encourage Jack to leave.
The reason Mr. Twist couldn't get anyone to help out on the ranch was because the ranch was out in the middle of nowhere. I think it was the ss that said the nearest neighbor was either 8 or 10 miles away. Plus the fact the ranch was far from civilization as it was. It wasn't a big ranch so I doubt Mr. Twist would need one or two men at the most. Kind of a lonely existence I would think and not very desirable place to work. Maybe this is why Mr. Twist accepted Jack's sexual orientation. He didn't care if Jack slept with a cow as long as he had help on the ranch.
So, yes, Mr. Twist was disappointed in his only son. Jack kept promising to come back to the ranch and bring another man to help out. But here is the old man thinking, ok, so you are a queer, but you can't even find a man to bring back to the ranch to help out. For 20 years you been telling me you were going to bring this Ennis del Mar guy out here. Where is he?
So here we have an old man trying to run a small ranch out in the middle of nowhere all by himself. Ranching is work for young men. Here we have old Mr. Twist realizing his only son is dead and probably praying his wife will die before he does because she certainly can't run the ranch. Here is an old man who thought the ranch would one day belong to Jack but now it will go to the State of Wyoming because there is nobody to inherit it when he dies. Bitter, you bet he was bitter; and as far as I am concerned he had a right to be bitter. But he wasn't bitter about Jack's sexual orientation. In fact, Mr. Twist was counting on it, just waiting for his son to bring a man home that could help out. Jack couldn't even do that right.
So, if you and the others want to hate Mr. Twist, nothing I can do or say will change your mind. But if you want to see a story and understand everything that was happening, think about the things I have said and maybe you too will see Mr. Twist in a different light. Put yourself in his shoes before you hate him.
And you know the really sad part of this story? Ennis didn't mind being with Jack out in the middle of nowhere. And there was a steady job he could have had AND he could have been with Jack....in the middle of nowhere. They COULD have had a sweet life together.
Watch the movie again and this time notice that when Ennis leaves the Twist home he looks around at what he COULD have had, and had it with Jack, the man he now realizes he was in love with. THERE is the true sadness of the movie. :\'(
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It's true Jack says he couldn't please his father whateve rhe did - this may have been because his father clearly criticized and found fault with everything he did so he became self-conscious and nervous; this then carried in to later life. Ennis in contrast was competent, and Randall appears to have been so too, and he had a college education " for what it's worth" - sorry - couldn't resist - my prejudices are showing). If Jack thought of bringing either to Lightning Flat it might have been as a means of demonstrating to his father that he had competent/accomplished friends who would provide a counterweight against his father.
Welshwitch, I have bolded (is that a word?) a few words in your quote because these are words of speculation. We know Jack wasn't competant at a lot of things. He couldn't shoot a coyote, he couldn't open a can of beans without getting it all over himself. And there were other things he wasn't good at, some of which you yourself pointed out in other threads. Hell, he couldn't even pee in a toilet without getting it all over the place. But the point is we saw Jack's incompetencies when his father was nowhere around him to make him nervous or self-conscious. Jack was just a lovable and loving man who wasn't too good at many things men of that time and place were good at. That doesn't make him a defective or anything. Hell, I'll bet he could whip up a nice party dress in no time. ;D
Just joking to keep things light. :8
And for you to suggest that Jack fell in love with Ennis because he was competant or Randall because he had a college education so that, "it might have been as a means of demonstrating to his father that he had competent/accomplished friends who would provide a counterweight against his father." is just preposterous. I can not believe you reread what you wrote there because I just KNOW you don't think that yourself.
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Oh, but I do think that or I wouldn't have written it. I've done it myself in the past - "Look, here's my friend.She's clever and can do this, that and the other and SHE likes me even if you don't," is what's going on subconsciously in this scenario. Jack clearly has a difficult relationship with his father and in that case bringing a friend who cared for and about him when he came home would help him stand up to his father.
As far as Jack's lack of competence goes, if you've been criticized often enough over sometyhing, later even when the person who criticized is no longer there when you try to do whatever it is, the little vvoice plays in your head, telling you not to make a mess this time - and inevitably you do.
I don't know whether or not Jack is good at his job - LD doesn't think so and is apparently eager to buy him off. The business was profitable before he came along and with Kureen in charge of the finances looks to be going on making money - and she'd hardly sack her own husband not, i think, would LD do it overtly - he's rather try and bribe him to go away.
I thionk the word is " embolden" - I think it's a silly word, so I don't use it. "To bold" is good; "I bold, you bolded, he has bolded." There's a school of linguistics bods ( a group I hate as much as l loathe lit theorists) who say if you use a word it exists. So there you go - academically you are approved of, if it matters!!!
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And you know the really sad part of this story? Ennis didn't mind being with Jack out in the middle of nowhere. And there was a steady job he could have had AND he could have been with Jack....in the middle of nowhere. They COULD have had a sweet life together.
Watch the movie again and this time notice that when Ennis leaves the Twist home he looks around at what he COULD have had, and had it with Jack, the man he now realizes he was in love with. THERE is the true sadness of the movie. :\'(
You know, I never even considered that before. There's definitely some merit in what you say....although I think part of Ennis' "middle of nowhere" rule was that there wouldn't be anyone else around either so whether he could have lived at Lightning Flat with Jack's parents is debatable. I think he realises that Jack's mum understood about the nature of his "friendship" with Jack but, even if it's not actually the case (and your argument is pretty persuasive), I think Ennis sees Jack's father as mean and unaccepting of his son's (and therefore Ennis') sexual orientation, so that would have been a major sticking point. Remember that the only impression Ennis has of Jack's father before he meets him is what Jack has told him - Jack could never please him, he never taught Jack a thing about rodeoing, he never gave him any support at rodeos and (from the SS only) he beat Jack as a child. Nothing that John Twist does when Ennis meets him would change that impression....so I don't know if Ennis does believe they could have had that sweet life there.
Blimey, I think I'm going round in circles here :-\\
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Oh, but I do think that or I wouldn't have written it. I've done it myself in the past - "Look, here's my friend.She's clever and can do this, that and the other and SHE likes me even if you don't," is what's going on subconsciously in this scenario. Jack clearly has a difficult relationship with his father and in that case bringing a friend who cared for and about him when he came home would help him stand up to his father.
So you actually believe that as Jack got to know Ennis, as Jack got to see Ennis was good at everything he did, Jack was thinking, 'Damn, I think I will fall in love with this guy so I can take him home to daddy and stick him under daddy's nose'?
All I can say to that is....WOW![/i][/u]
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Blimey, I think I'm going round in circles here :-
I think you are going around in circles also NoReins. Of course Ennis never thought they had a chance living on the Twist Ranch. Jack never told Ennis that was his plan so why would Ennis have even considered it? ;D
And you know the really sad part of this story? Ennis didn't mind being with Jack out in the middle of nowhere. And there was a steady job he could have had AND he could have been with Jack....in the middle of nowhere. They COULD have had a sweet life together.
Watch the movie again and this time notice that when Ennis leaves the Twist home he looks around at what he COULD have had, and had it with Jack, the man he now realizes he was in love with. THERE is the true sadness of the movie. :'(
You know, I never even considered that before. There's definitely some merit in what you say....although I think part of Ennis' "middle of nowhere" rule was that there wouldn't be anyone else around either so whether he could have lived at Lightning Flat with Jack's parents is debatable. I think he realises that Jack's mum understood about the nature of his "friendship" with Jack but, even if it's not actually the case (and your argument is pretty persuasive), I think Ennis sees Jack's father as mean and unaccepting of his son's (and therefore Ennis') sexual orientation, so that would have been a major sticking point. Remember that the only impression Ennis has of Jack's father before he meets him is what Jack has told him - Jack could never please him, he never taught Jack a thing about rodeoing, he never gave him any support at rodeos and (from the SS only) he beat Jack as a child. Nothing that John Twist does when Ennis meets him would change that impression....so I don't know if Ennis does believe they could have had that sweet life there.
I am not sure how you can say Ennis saw Mr. Twist as being against Jack's, and therefore Ennis', sexual orientation. John Twist sat there and told Ennis Jack said he was going to bring Ennis up there and build a cabin for the two of them. Mr. Twist didn't say it in a disgusted or accusatory tone to indicate he was against it or their life-styles. In fact, he said it in such a way that Ennis smiled. And he did it right there in the Twist dining room, in front of John C Twist and Ma Twist. Ennis must have been thinking, 'That little bugger told his parents about us and the old man isn't saying anything negative except that I never came up here to live.'
If Ennis didn't like Mr. Twist is wasn't because of anything Mr. Twist said about Jack and him or Jack and Randall, it was because Mr. Twist wouldn't let him take Jack's ashes to Brokeback like he wanted. But then, wouldn't Ennis be just as mad at Lureen? Lureen could have offered Ennis Jack's ashes to take to Brokeback also. Why would she ever want them herself now knowing what she did about Jack?
As for your other points, if Jack had told Ennis they could live on the Twist Ranch and Ennis had objected, don't you think Jack would have told Ennis he had an open relationship with his parents and would have backpeddled like mad by telling him all the other things he had said bad about his father were really his fault and not his fathers? Don't you think Jack would have told Ennis the Ranch was in the middle of nowhere and the nearest neighbor was 8 to 10 miles away and they wouldn't have known who was living in the cabin? That all people would know was that Jack had his own bedroom in his parent's home and Ennis was a hired hand living in the cabin. Why would they know any more? It isn't like the Twists had neighbors dropping in every week, or every month, or maybe ever.
So the question really is, why didn't Jack ever tell Ennis of his plan for the two of them to move to the Twist Ranch? The answer is simple, it would have changed the SS, the screenplay and the movie way too much.
I mean, can't you just picture the scene if there was no story to stick to? Jack and Ennis in the tent after some wild and wonderful sex. Jack cuddled up against Ennis rubbing his chest and saying, 'Ennis, now that you are divorced, I got to tell you that my parents own this little ranch out in the middle of nowhere. For 15 years now I have been telling Mom and Dad I was going to bring you up there to live in a cabin with me and we were going to help run the ranch. Dad may not be crazy about us living together but he is more interested in having some help than he is about who I sleep with. Mom is pretty cool about it also. The point is, it is in the middle of nowhere, like you want, with the nearest neighbor 8 to 10 miles away.' And then Ennis saying, 'Yah. But I thought your dad was a bastard.' And Jack replying, 'Well, after thinking about it he wasn't such a bad old man. Oh sure, he beat me when i kept missing the toilet all the time and he would get mad when I couldn't do things correctly, but I guess I would have been the same way if it were my son. The point is Ennis, you want us to be away from people so nobody will find out. The ranch is out in the middle of nowhere so nobody will find out. My parents already know so that won't be anything new to them. You would have a job you wouldn't have to keep quiting. You could bring your girls up there once a month to visit. We could be real happy there and I know dad would welcome the help.' And on goes the discussion until Ennis agrees to at least visit the ranch to see what he would be getting into.
But we've got a story to tell and none of that could happen.
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Interesting discussion here!
I for one don't cut John Twist any slack on the "he resents Jack for not staying to help with the ranch" for several reasons. I also don't think Jack and Ennis moving to the Twist place would have worked out, either.
(1) Expecting a child to not break away from the nest and build their own lives is the action of a selfish parent. And resenting them bitterly for decades for having done so is stinks of jealousy and bitterness. Anyone who cares to look (and are old enough to have lived life a little while) has seen the type of stunted adulthood this type of parental expectation can produce.
(2) If John hoped that Jack would choose on his own to stay around the ranch, he should have fostered a better relationship with his child. From the glimpses we have of the Twist home life it seems like just the opposite...the type of place where most any type of child would want to leave as soon as they could walk.
(3) John Twist couldn't get help because he was too remote? "Remote" is a very relative term in a place like Wyoming. Several miles between neighbors is nothing. Sometimes just to get to the buildings from a public (dirt) road is a couple miles. And in the perpetually-economically-depressed open west, ranchhand work had to be pretty awful for nobody to take it back then. Look at the remote, lousy, unsteady work that Ennis and Jack took just to have a job. If John Twist couldn't get help, I suspect he either paid nothing, offered terrible conditions, or both. Probably doesn't take too long to get a reputation.
(4) If Jack did stay at...or return to...the Twist ranch, what kind of life would he have had? His parents were dirt poor and don't appear to be making it on that ranch. Would it have been able to support Jack and Ennis or someone else as well? And would John have let Jack take the ranch over? Doubt it. I come from a farm background and have seen people like John Twist plenty. They expect their son to be their hired man until they drop dead...be loyal and work like a dog as the father gets older and can do less, but won't sell the place to them. The son gets to be 40 or 50 or older and doesn't own a dang thing to show for their years of hard work. Don't control anything, don't get to make any decisions. Their only hope is that the old man dies while they are still young enough to get something out of it. Assuming the old man's decisions and ways didn't drive the place in to the ground in the first place, there might be something to inherit. Seen this very thing happen many times. Breeds hate and resentment. And I can think of several instances where the son's marriage was busted up by this very situation. The daughter-in-law resents her father and mother in law for not letting them build their own life, and she resents the son (her husband) for letting himself be pushed around by his father. Jack and Ennis live happily ever after with the Twists? I think that's a long shot.
(5) I think that John Twist is dripping with disgust when he talks about his son wanting to build a cabin and live with a man. Right from the first moment he says "Ennis Del Mar". If he really wanted this (so he'd have help) his contempt would be sharpest when he says that this was just another half-baked plan of Jack's. He might even have sounded wistful, positive or at very least neutral about Jack's plan to come home with another man to help out on the ranch, then turned sour at the "but it never happened" part. I don't hear any of that. Rather, I think John Twist is coming from his own perspective where men don't live together unless they are queers, and that's just wrong and disgusting. Everybody knows that, and it sickens him to think that his own son was one of them. As for Mrs. Twist, well, it's hard to know exactly how she would have been if she actually had to face facts right up front. When we meet her, years had passed and she had a lot more time to get used to the idea, versus if Jack just showed up at 19 or 23 with Ennis one day and they lived together. Also, when a loved one dies, it's very common to have a change of heart about things. In her grief and longing for her son, Mrs Twist showed great compassion and understanding for her son's lover. No guarantee she would haver reacted as supportively if instead Jack and Ennis showed up and started bunking together.
(6) I doubt that Ennis would have accepted the remoteness of the Twist place as any kind of comfort to allow him to live with Jack. Ennis would have had to stay secluded on the Twist place for years -- never go to town, never go to the doctor, or dentist, or a movie, or to vote, or to or buy anything. Why would he have to do this? Because word gets around quickly in a rural community. Even if Ennis got mail the local postmaster or postmistress would know that Ennis lived with the Twists. And from local experience growing up in rural areas in the 70's and 80's, they gossip. Maybe nobody would have hassled Jack and Ennis, but the critical thing is that Ennis believed that. I don't think the Twist place would have offered the level of security Ennis needed. Heck, I don't think he would have accepted living in a cabin up in the mountains, either. It wasn't only remoteness but "appropriateness" that allowed him to be comforable with Jack. Two guys camped together for fishing or hunting? Nothing unusual about that. Two grown men living together, just the two of them? No good way to explain that.
I do understand the line of thinking followed in some of these threads, but I run into roadblocks following it. And so I view it a little differently.
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The manner in which Mr. Twist spoke was as a bitter old and tired man who was disappointed by his only son. I am sure Mr. Twist had expected his son to work the ranch with him and one day take over. Didn't happen.
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And you know the really sad part of this story? Ennis didn't mind being with Jack out in the middle of nowhere. And there was a steady job he could have had AND he could have been with Jack....in the middle of nowhere. They COULD have had a sweet life together.
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So true, so sad. That maybe they could have had that sweet life. Though Jack never mentioned that it would be his Dad's Lightning Flat ranch. Did he ever say that in the SS?
kathy
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Interesting discussion here!
Dale: Interesting indeed. Your post is great, food for thought re: the Jack's father, Jack's bringing Ennis there. About Ennis: so sad -- as you said, no situation would really be right enough for Ennis. They should have moved to Alaska where (supposedly) people could live without being troubled by anyone about anything...
kathy
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The whole point about the "fishing" trips is that they were brief enough to pass off as no more than that, two old buddies off for a week together in the mountains. Making it into any sort of permanent arrangement would have changed it totally, and Ennis wouldn't have contemplated that - as indeed he never did.
The idea of bringing Ennis up to Lightning Flat was Jack's alone - no indication that he ever mentioned it to Ennis and from Ennis's reaction to what John Twist says, it was new to him. He smiles because he likes the idea - but it's an idea he never has to contemplate putting into practice because Jack is dead.
In the same way the whole idea of bringing Ennis there and living on the racnh is Jack's idea, not something that he ever tries to put into practice. It's something to gloat over mentally, thinking of how it would be, not something that was ever going to be a reality. You don't plan you reactions but you do often think almost without willing it of what you'd like to do or see happening. I think Jack would love to bring Ennis up to the ranch and throw him in his father's face, but he knows it's not going to happen.
The sweet life was never within Ennis's grasp because he never believed it was.
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So many of the recent posts have been interesting to read and think about. Dalemidex, I think you are right on, especially your point # 5. People say a lot without using their voices and what they do actually speak is only a small portion of what they mean. John Twist's tone of voice and stare and body language all point to what you said. He was disgusted to think Jack was gay ( and Ennis and Randall, or anyone else). Patriot, I agree with you about the bitterness, but I still maintain that bitterness often makes itself known through mean actions and words.
You surmised that, if I think John Twist is mean becasuse of his wife's actions, then Ennis was mean according to the reticence Alma shows towards him. Maybe you are right. I DO think Ennis had a mean streak. You may call it a hot temper, or anything else ( built up frustrations that occasionally erupted into violence). Call a rose by any other name and it's still a rose. So Ennis' flare-ups could be called many things, but the fact is, he WAS volatile and Alma knew that. In another thread, someone suggested and I agreed that Alma never confronted Ennis about seeing the kiss because of her fear of Ennis.
You bring up Jack's incompetence, and I, as you, I think, see nothing condemning about incompetence. It's just a trait some poeple have more of than others. I doubt, though, if any of us could have opened a can of bean lying prone, as was Jack in that scene. I'm a whizz with a can-opener, but I couldn't have done it. I think Jack is just silly sometimes -- doesn't always make wise decisions. We see that several times in the movie, too, I think.
Well, this is an interesting thread and it sure shows how many different takes there are on one issue in this story. I do wonder, thoiugh, what it is that makes you, Patriot, so certain that John Twist knew and would have been accepting of Jack ( and Ennis") sexuality? Did he say something, or do something that leads you to that certainty?
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Interesting discussion here!
I for one don't cut John Twist any slack on the "he resents Jack for not staying to help with the ranch" for several reasons. I also don't think Jack and Ennis moving to the Twist place would have worked out, either.
Well, sounds like we have an accident scene here dalemidex. You know, an accident witnessed by two people who see the accident in different ways.
(1) Expecting a child to not break away from the nest and build their own lives is the action of a selfish parent. And resenting them bitterly for decades for having done so is stinks of jealousy and bitterness. Anyone who cares to look (and are old enough to have lived life a little while) has seen the type of stunted adulthood this type of parental expectation can produce.
Well then there are an awful lot of selfish parents living it the miswest U.S.A. I remember when the farmers of the U.S. were having troubles making a living; some so bad they were forced to sell pieces of their land to keep their heads above water. To a man they said they resented the situation they were in because they wanted to leave the farms to their kids but the way things were going their kids would have to find non-farm jobs. Eldest sons were also interviewed and a few wanted to get off of the farm but only because it was so difficult to make a living. Some of them were angry they would have to leave because the farm had been in their family for generations. But you know, I never heard one father or son say they hated farming.
(2) If John hoped that Jack would choose on his own to stay around the ranch, he should have fostered a better relationship with his child. From the glimpses we have of the Twist home life it seems like just the opposite...the type of place where most any type of child would want to leave as soon as they could walk.
Well, I think John Twist accepted his son's lifestyle and that was a big thing for a man like John Twist. As for the ranch and house not being in the best shape, well, hard to make money working a ranch alone. Maybe if Jack had stuck around and brought someone up there to help out the ranch could have grown and there would have been more money and they could have lived better.
(3) John Twist couldn't get help because he was too remote? "Remote" is a very relative term in a place like Wyoming. Several miles between neighbors is nothing. Sometimes just to get to the buildings from a public (dirt) road is a couple miles. And in the perpetually-economically-depressed open west, ranchhand work had to be pretty awful for nobody to take it back then. Look at the remote, lousy, unsteady work that Ennis and Jack took just to have a job. If John Twist couldn't get help, I suspect he either paid nothing, offered terrible conditions, or both. Probably doesn't take too long to get a reputation.
You need money to pay anything at all and it was clear they had very little to pay anyone. As for terrible conditions, with nobody to help run the ranch there surely wasn't anyone to maintain a bunkhouse so I guess the conditions were pretty bad, yes.
(4) If Jack did stay at...or return to...the Twist ranch, what kind of life would he have had? His parents were dirt poor and don't appear to be making it on that ranch. Would it have been able to support Jack and Ennis or someone else as well? And would John have let Jack take the ranch over? Doubt it. I come from a farm background and have seen people like John Twist plenty. They expect their son to be their hired man until they drop dead...be loyal and work like a dog as the father gets older and can do less, but won't sell the place to them. The son gets to be 40 or 50 or older and doesn't own a dang thing to show for their years of hard work. Don't control anything, don't get to make any decisions. Their only hope is that the old man dies while they are still young enough to get something out of it. Assuming the old man's decisions and ways didn't drive the place in to the ground in the first place, there might be something to inherit. Seen this very thing happen many times. Breeds hate and resentment. And I can think of several instances where the son's marriage was busted up by this very situation. The daughter-in-law resents her father and mother in law for not letting them build their own life, and she resents the son (her husband) for letting himself be pushed around by his father. Jack and Ennis live happily ever after with the Twists? I think that's a long shot.
Well, everything you said here is speculation. I would thing that John Twist would let his son and son-in-law run the ranch as they saw fit if the boys could show they could increase the money coming in. But that is speculation also I guess. Mr. Twist would have been a fool if he stopped the boys from making the ranch a good business.
(5) I think that John Twist is dripping with disgust when he talks about his son wanting to build a cabin and live with a man. Right from the first moment he says "Ennis Del Mar". If he really wanted this (so he'd have help) his contempt would be sharpest when he says that this was just another half-baked plan of Jack's. He might even have sounded wistful, positive or at very least neutral about Jack's plan to come home with another man to help out on the ranch, then turned sour at the "but it never happened" part. I don't hear any of that. Rather, I think John Twist is coming from his own perspective where men don't live together unless they are queers, and that's just wrong and disgusting. Everybody knows that, and it sickens him to think that his own son was one of them. As for Mrs. Twist, well, it's hard to know exactly how she would have been if she actually had to face facts right up front. When we meet her, years had passed and she had a lot more time to get used to the idea, versus if Jack just showed up at 19 or 23 with Ennis one day and they lived together. Also, when a loved one dies, it's very common to have a change of heart about things. In her grief and longing for her son, Mrs Twist showed great compassion and understanding for her son's lover. No guarantee she would haver reacted as supportively if instead Jack and Ennis showed up and started bunking together.
Again I disagree. By the time Mr. Twist gave Ennis his little speech, 20 years had passed and he was bitter. By that time he had become a bitter and tired old man waiting for Jack to bring Ennis up there to help out. Then too, Mr. Twist could have been bitter toward Ennis for not coming.
(6) I doubt that Ennis would have accepted the remoteness of the Twist place as any kind of comfort to allow him to live with Jack. Ennis would have had to stay secluded on the Twist place for years -- never go to town, never go to the doctor, or dentist, or a movie, or to vote, or to or buy anything. Why would he have to do this? Because word gets around quickly in a rural community. Even if Ennis got mail the local postmaster or postmistress would know that Ennis lived with the Twists. And from local experience growing up in rural areas in the 70's and 80's, they gossip. Maybe nobody would have hassled Jack and Ennis, but the critical thing is that Ennis believed that. I don't think the Twist place would have offered the level of security Ennis needed. Heck, I don't think he would have accepted living in a cabin up in the mountains, either. It wasn't only remoteness but "appropriateness" that allowed him to be comforable with Jack. Two guys camped together for fishing or hunting? Nothing unusual about that. Two grown men living together, just the two of them? No good way to explain that.
I don't buy one word of that. Here is why. Let us say Mr. Twist had the money to hire some men to help out. Would each man have their own house? No, of course not. They would live together in a bunkhouse. If what you say is true, why wouldn't they worry about what people might say? Because people wouldn't say it that is why. What would they know about Ennis? That he is a ranch hand living in a cabin on the Twist Ranch. Why would they know Jack lived their also? For all they knew Jack was staying in his room in the main house. Nothing to explain there at all. All people would know is that the Twist kid came home to work the ranch after making some money somewhere in Texas. Enough money to hire a ranch hand.
I do understand the line of thinking followed in some of these threads, but I run into roadblocks following it. And so I view it a little differently.
Yep. That accident thing again.
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So true, so sad. That maybe they could have had that sweet life. Though Jack never mentioned that it would be his Dad's Lightning Flat ranch. Did he ever say that in the SS?
kathy
No, the Twist Ranch was never mentioned by Jack to Ennis.
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I do wonder, thoiugh, what it is that makes you, Patriot, so certain that John Twist knew and would have been accepting of Jack ( and Ennis") sexuality? Did he say something, or do something that leads you to that certainty?
When I was 17 my mother didn't accept my homosexuality or me. She told me to get out of her house. So, for a short time I lived on the streets. I would never have told here I had a lover and we were going to come back and build a cabin and help with the farm. Jack did that. He freely and openly told his father he was going to bring Ennis back home and they were going to build a cabin to live in. Then it was Randall only this time he was going to divorce his wife also. If Jack had felt his father would not accept that idea or his homosexuality he would never have told him in the first place. And even if he did not know how his father was going to react when he told him about Ennis, he sure knew by the time Randall came around and yet he freely told his father again. Sounds to me like a son telling his father about his sex life and a father just waiting for his son to bring a man home to help out. Hell, if John Twist was against his son's sexual orientation he would have told Jack to forget it and not come home. Jack wasn't any help to him anyway.
Now I am not saying Mr. Twist liked his son's sexual orientation, and I am pretty sure he wouldn't throw them a 25 anniversary party, but he was resigned to it if he could just get some help on the ranch.
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Well, Patriot, I know this comment in OT, but I sure hope your mother wised up over time, and things worked out between the two of you.
Back OT: I think you really have gotten into John Twist's head, and I understand a bit better why you believe what you believe about John's accepting ( although perhapos, not preferring, Jack's mate). Although what you say is a possibility, I still don't think John's tone of voice and body language shout anything but ridicule and skepticiam of Jack and Ennis. Just MHO, but I hear censure in every word he says to Ennis, not frustration because he and Jack never did come up to help with the ranch. One thing we Do agree on, I think, though, is that Jack's words did mean something to the old man. He remembered Ennis's name and he remembered Jack's dream to come up there and help out, so these things were very important to John, for one reason or another.
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Hi Patriot--
I very much like your witness-to-an-accident analogy!
(1) Expecting a child to not break away from the nest and build their own lives is the action of a selfish parent. And resenting them bitterly for decades for having done so is stinks of jealousy and bitterness. Anyone who cares to look (and are old enough to have lived life a little while) has seen the type of stunted adulthood this type of parental expectation can produce.
Well then there are an awful lot of selfish parents living it the miswest U.S.A. I remember when the farmers of the U.S. were having troubles making a living; some so bad they were forced to sell pieces of their land to keep their heads above water. To a man they said they resented the situation they were in because they wanted to leave the farms to their kids but the way things were going their kids would have to find non-farm jobs. Eldest sons were also interviewed and a few wanted to get off of the farm but only because it was so difficult to make a living. Some of them were angry they would have to leave because the farm had been in their family for generations. But you know, I never heard one father or son say they hated farming.
It's not a matter of hating farming -- fathers and their sons both generally want the farm to continue to pass from generation to generation. Most farm fathers do want a son to follow in their footsteps -- in the abstract. What's much harder to do is in fact step down and give up control. That's because farmers generally have most of their self worth built on that farm and it kills them to see anyone else -- even their own son -- take over and make decision. In my own family, one in which we get along better than most I see -- this still came into play. My grandfather wouldn't sell until he was simply too old to do anything and after my father had worked as a hired hand for more than 20 years without getting to own anything more than his car and his family's household possessions. When it came time for my father to retire, he swore he'd not make the same mistake his father did. So he sold to my brother 20 years ago, and ever since then my father hasn't been able to keep his nose out of his son's business because he still feels like it is "his" farm. My brother's ways are different than my father's, and it causes constand conflict in the family and puts a huge strain on my brother's marriage. My brother has been a successful farmer for years, but my father will to this day (he's in his mid-80's) say that he should have never sold the farm, and will break out into angry profanity based on some as simple as my brother being among the last in the area to get a particular field task accomplished.
Yet if you'd ask either of them, they'd definitely say similar things to what you've heard in the media -- about wanting to keep the farm in the family, about it being difficult economically to do so, about how hard it would be to give it up and the hardships they sometimes endure to make it. My family's experience is not unusual in farming communities, and it often doesn't work out as well as ours has. No estrangement and no divorce, but I can think of several instances just from our area with both.
The reason I see John Twist as just this type of ranch owner is that in spite of being old, dirt poor, and having no help, he didn't sell the place and move to town. Old stubborn farmers are removed from their dilapidated farmsteads by ambulances and hea rse.
(4) If Jack did stay at...or return to...the Twist ranch, what kind of life would he have had? His parents were dirt poor and don't appear to be making it on that ranch. Would it have been able to support Jack and Ennis or someone else as well? And would John have let Jack take the ranch over? Doubt it. I come from a farm background and have seen people like John Twist plenty. They expect their son to be their hired man until they drop dead...be loyal and work like a dog as the father gets older and can do less, but won't sell the place to them. The son gets to be 40 or 50 or older and doesn't own a dang thing to show for their years of hard work. Don't control anything, don't get to make any decisions. Their only hope is that the old man dies while they are still young enough to get something out of it. Assuming the old man's decisions and ways didn't drive the place in to the ground in the first place, there might be something to inherit. Seen this very thing happen many times. Breeds hate and resentment. And I can think of several instances where the son's marriage was busted up by this very situation. The daughter-in-law resents her father and mother in law for not letting them build their own life, and she resents the son (her husband) for letting himself be pushed around by his father. Jack and Ennis live happily ever after with the Twists? I think that's a long shot.
Well, everything you said here is speculation. I would thing that John Twist would let his son and son-in-law run the ranch as they saw fit if the boys could show they could increase the money coming in. But that is speculation also I guess. Mr. Twist would have been a fool if he stopped the boys from making the ranch a good business.
Unfortunately, I just don't see John Twist as the type to let Jack and/or Ennis to really run the place. Money, or the prospect of it with Jack and Ennis running the place, is not the motivator. Stepping aside admits defeat in the only thing that really matters to a hardscrabble homesteader like John Twist. A successful Jack & Ennis would only rub into John's eyes that he was a failure. And we already know Jack has said he couldn't do anything right in his daddy's eyes, and so I question that Jack would stick around even if it were tried.
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(5) I think that John Twist is dripping with disgust when he talks about his son wanting to build a cabin and live with a man. Right from the first moment he says "Ennis Del Mar". If he really wanted this (so he'd have help) his contempt would be sharpest when he says that this was just another half-baked plan of Jack's. He might even have sounded wistful, positive or at very least neutral about Jack's plan to come home with another man to help out on the ranch, then turned sour at the "but it never happened" part. I don't hear any of that. Rather, I think John Twist is coming from his own perspective where men don't live together unless they are queers, and that's just wrong and disgusting. Everybody knows that, and it sickens him to think that his own son was one of them. As for Mrs. Twist, well, it's hard to know exactly how she would have been if she actually had to face facts right up front. When we meet her, years had passed and she had a lot more time to get used to the idea, versus if Jack just showed up at 19 or 23 with Ennis one day and they lived together. Also, when a loved one dies, it's very common to have a change of heart about things. In her grief and longing for her son, Mrs Twist showed great compassion and understanding for her son's lover. No guarantee she would haver reacted as supportively if instead Jack and Ennis showed up and started bunking together.
Again I disagree. By the time Mr. Twist gave Ennis his little speech, 20 years had passed and he was bitter. By that time he had become a bitter and tired old man waiting for Jack to bring Ennis up there to help out. Then too, Mr. Twist could have been bitter toward Ennis for not coming.
I just don't see John Twist waiting up there for Jack to come up and take over all those years.
John Twist says quite freely -- and in some ways he's not too far off based on the Jack we see in the story -- that his talk of bringing Ennis up to the ranch and whipping it into shape was just one of countless windbag Jack statements that were not going to come to pass. His son has a wife and kid and a good life down in Texas, and yet John Twist thinks that someday Jack is going to make good on that promise? The promise to someday bail him out of his hopeless situation?
I don't see John Twist's statements as saying:
"He promised for years to bring you up here and finally help get this place to where it should be, but he never came through for me".
Rather, I think the underlying message is:
"The no-good jerk thought he was gonna be real smart and show me up someday Come up here and show me how I SHOULD have been running this place all these years, that he could do it better than me. But the gutless bum didn't even have the balls to try and make good on his threats. Just a big bag of wind he was."
John Twist quoting his son's plan to bring Ennis and "whip this damn ranch into shape", that wasn't "someday I'm going to help you Daddy". It was a direct blow to John Twist's ego. As I said before, many farmers view their land and place not just as a reflection of who they are, but the whole of who they are. Jack's statements clearly implied that his daddy wasn't cutting it, and that was certainly a huge offense to John Twist. That's why he'd say this to Ennis, because ultimiatly he beleive he got in the last laugh -- the pissant son of his never stood up to the old stud duck.
He wasn't disappointed his son failed in keeping promises to help him out. He was disgusted with his son's failure to meet his definition of a man -- and never challenging him in this way was just one more way he didn't measure up.
(6) I doubt that Ennis would have accepted the remoteness of the Twist place as any kind of comfort to allow him to live with Jack. Ennis would have had to stay secluded on the Twist place for years -- never go to town, never go to the doctor, or dentist, or a movie, or to vote, or to or buy anything. Why would he have to do this? Because word gets around quickly in a rural community. Even if Ennis got mail the local postmaster or postmistress would know that Ennis lived with the Twists. And from local experience growing up in rural areas in the 70's and 80's, they gossip. Maybe nobody would have hassled Jack and Ennis, but the critical thing is that Ennis believed that. I don't think the Twist place would have offered the level of security Ennis needed. Heck, I don't think he would have accepted living in a cabin up in the mountains, either. It wasn't only remoteness but "appropriateness" that allowed him to be comforable with Jack. Two guys camped together for fishing or hunting? Nothing unusual about that. Two grown men living together, just the two of them? No good way to explain that.
I don't buy one word of that. Here is why. Let us say Mr. Twist had the money to hire some men to help out. Would each man have their own house? No, of course not. They would live together in a bunkhouse. If what you say is true, why wouldn't they worry about what people might say? Because people wouldn't say it that is why. What would they know about Ennis? That he is a ranch hand living in a cabin on the Twist Ranch. Why would they know Jack lived their also? For all they knew Jack was staying in his room in the main house. Nothing to explain there at all. All people would know is that the Twist kid came home to work the ranch after making some money somewhere in Texas. Enough money to hire a ranch hand.
Two things to support my opinon on that:
(1) At small ranches, ranch hand work tended to be more intermittant and transient. And these types of jobs tended to be younger guys who sometimes didn't work at the same place twice, or if they did it wasn't constant through the winter. Ennis would have been there 24/7 for years. Not normal. More steady ranch work, like the kind Ennis had as a mirried man, did indeed often go to men who rented their own place and had a wife and family. Ennis living year after year on the Twist place would have stuck out, especially as they got older. Remember, too, that at this same time Jack's lack of wife and family would have also been increasingly apparent.
In my part of the world they're not called ranch hands but are instead called hired men. And in some instances they live on the farm where they work. In the rural area where I was raised, we all knew a couple of hired-man situations that were definitely "fishy" -- mostly male-female but not entirely.
(2) Just as important, the kicker was Ennis perception that things would eventually look too fishy. No matter if people eventually put 2 + 2 together or not, Ennis would have feared it none the less. Ennis' fear was what really held him back even if his fear wasn't always rational or in proportion to reality.
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I know as much about farming and ranching as I do about rodeo-ing (ie nothing), but I can appreciate Jack's dad must have had a hard time of it, but I'm sorry, I still can't bring myself to have any sympathy for him. Maybe if I hadn't read the ss I might, but finding out that he beat Jack was the final straw for me. What sort of person attacks a four year old child with a belt? :( I know that in those days it was accepted that parents used corporal punishment to discipline their kids, but whipping a helpless four year old with a belt is just vicious and evil, it makes Jack's dad nothing but a bully and a gutless coward imo :X And the worst thing is, Jack still obviously wanted his love and approval, wanting to be a bull rider like him, helping on the ranch when he went back home,but nothing he did could ever please his dad :( He should think himself lucky that Jack ever went back at all(although he probably went to see his mum, rather than his dad).
I don't think Jack living on the ranch with anyone would have ever happened, Jack may have said it to taunt his dad,both about his inability to run the place properly and about his homosexuality,but the way he spits into his cup after he says about Jack and Ennis moving there, it's like he's disgusted by the thought, and would never allow that to happen on his ranch. And the way he tells the story, it's like he's setting Ennis up for a fall, he only says it so that he can then bring up Randall and add to Ennis's pain, he knows Ennis is grieving for Jack, but he can't resist making it worse, and seems to me like he's enjoying it :X But I love the way Jack's mum immediately goes to comfort Ennis by touching his shoulder and telling him he's welcome to go up to Jack's room, it's like she's telling him to take no notice of her husband, she knows it was him, and only him, who Jack loved, and she knows by going to Jack's room, Ennis will realise and remember that.
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*o)
Well, Patriot, I know this comment in OT, but I sure hope your mother wised up over time, and things worked out between the two of you.
No,Lamusica. Mother died in 1980. The only time she ever "talked" to me or even acknowledged me was when we were at a family gathering and her mother, my grandmother, was around.
The damn woman was more stubborn than I am. ;)
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I don't find any sympathy for John Twist either, but Patriot 1's posts have made me look at him from another angle - it's hard for the 21st-century town-dwelling English to get into the mindset of a 20th-century American rancher - most of my ideas of ranching come from movies or from seeing huge places in Texas. And I supose one must grant him complexity - both needing help and needing to see himself as unable to cope single-handed and at the same time caught up in the resentment of the older for the younger generation, before questions of Jack's sexuality enter into it.
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I want to say that I share welshwitch's sentiments directly above. Patriot, you have shed a new way of thinking about Mr. Twist to those of us following this thread. So, even if we don't agree with you (Here I am speaking for myself only), We have heard a different interpretation for John Twist's wors and actions.
(Terribly sorry about your mom's stubbornness. One is just WAY TOO stubborn when it alienates a woman from her son. What a loss tp her ( self-inflicted!)!!!
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[We know Jack wasn't competant at a lot of things. He couldn't shoot a coyote, he couldn't open a can of beans without getting it all over himself. And there were other things he wasn't good at, some of which you yourself pointed out in other threads. Hell, he couldn't even pee in a toilet without getting it all over the place. But the point is we saw Jack's incompetencies when his father was nowhere around him to make him nervous or self-conscious. Jack was just a lovable and loving man who wasn't too good at many things men of that time and place were good at. That doesn't make him a defective or anything.
I agree that John Twist was more of a bitter man than a mean one, but the way he treated the four-year-old Jack was just nasty. He wasn't evil like Ennis' father was, but not a pleasent one to around with either. I think he was tired of running the ranch mostly by himself and he let that attitude out on Jack, who I think is as competant as anyone else. Jack may not be as good as Ennis at shooting a coyote, but in the ss, he was able to shoot an eagle. He said he was good with a can opener, so I think he was just being lazy or silly by doing it lying down and holding it awkwardly. Peeing on the toilet? How many four-year-olds can pee so neatly? Go into any public restroom and you can see even most grown up men make those messes. So, I don't see Jack's "incompetence" or sexuality playing a role in John Twist's behavior at all. He was just a tired, resentful, bitter old man.
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We know Jack wasn't competant at a lot of things. He couldn't shoot a coyote, he couldn't open a can of beans without getting it all over himself. And there were other things he wasn't good at, some of which you yourself pointed out in other threads. Hell, he couldn't even pee in a toilet without getting it all over the place. But the point is we saw Jack's incompetencies when his father was nowhere around him to make him nervous or self-conscious. Jack was just a lovable and loving man who wasn't too good at many things men of that time and place were good at. That doesn't make him a defective or anything.
I agree that John Twist was more of a bitter man than a mean one, but the way he treated the four-year-old Jack was just nasty. He wasn't evil like Ennis' father was, but not a pleasent one to around with either. I think he was tired of running the ranch mostly by himself and he let that attitude out on Jack, who I think is as competant as anyone else. Jack may not be as good as Ennis at shooting a coyote, but in the ss, he was able to shoot an eagle. He said he was good with a can opener, so I think he was just being lazy or silly by doing it lying down and holding it awkwardly. Peeing on the toilet? How many four-year-olds can pee so neatly? Go into any public restroom and you can see even most grown up men make those messes. So, I don't see Jack's "incompetence" or sexuality playing a role in John Twist's behavior at all. He was just a tired, resentful, bitter old man.
Oh my! It is so nice to finally have someone agree with me about Mr. Twist.
You have just become my hero JT ;)