A couple of days ago, a conversation started up between myself and a co-worker in which she started out saying " you know that part where the one guy got raped in the tent?.... Raped?. I informed her that no rape took place in the movie , but it just goes to show that society in general is misinformed as to the sex scenes in this film. She had no idea how much. Needless to say, I was shocked that she percieved FNIT this way . She went on to say she found it disgusting and disturbing, I went on to say, I found it stimulatingly erotic. There's some real half-bakes out here folks. To each his/or her own I guess. This is the first time this has happened, and I found it amazing to find myself having to defend Jack and Ennis. Has any one else had this experience? Just a mention...
Surely your work mate is" possessed "by some of the many clichés that are stil around gay relationships,mainly in a physical sense.The scene is rough and hard in this sense,because we can´t forget that sexual relationship-even if it´s made with love-is passion,and passion can be,if not aggressive and less still violent,kind of rude.We´ve seen a lot of these scenes between man and woman that is supposed to be allowed,and we can think:-"Hey,look at these two,wow¡";but never:-"Poor girl¡This guy is raping her¡"...Why can be different if they´re two men?.I really don´t know...
In this scene,take two young uneducated boys struggling with their sensations-very clear and fairly assumed in one case,hidden and always denied in the other...-and,in the first of them,struggling already with his feelings-it´s not so clear in the other´s case-,who are lonely and hungry with love and,why not? sex.Add quantities of alcohol,warm and proximity and you´ll get a boy half-drunken and half-slept,suddenly awaken with a clear intention:OMG¡ what will be his reaction?...
I´ve always thought that Jack wanted another kind of reaction,with more "prolegomena"-this word I already used once but I don´t know if it´s well used in English-,more in the line of SNIT before arriving to the "same point"
,more for showing Ennis his feelings and not only his whishes.
And also I´ve thought,even if Ennis reactions,whishes and feelings are much more messed,that he didn´t feel like doing as his mate wanted in this moment.IMO, his most impulsive side led him to take Jack,but his most reflexive(?) to say it in some way,side obliged him to mark who was in control then.I mean,he could wish Jack,but his mind told him he must be "the man" in the relationship,both phsycally and emotionally speaking,so his way of making love-having sex I´d say then...-to Jack was only a way to tell him:-"I may have my weaknesses,perhaps these are you,but I´m not queer;I´m a man and I´ going to behave like a man with you,no matter who you´re..."
I don´t know if all this makes sense or not,but I think that in this way it can be seen as a possession,a domination,a play of the "male role" without giving any opportunity to tenderness and sentimentalism-this is for women...-,as a way to protect himself and the role he had been thaught to have in life.But never can be seen as a rape,when we can speak about another very great and sad question,that´s not this.IMO.
