I have been collecting U.K. reviews of the dvd since BBM was released so thought i would start a thread for one if it's not already been done?
Jennis.x
MegaStar
Sun, Apr 30, 2006
Brokeback Mountain
(5 Stars)
Neil Davey
Already known around these parts as “that gay cowboy story” Brokeback Mountain is actually so much more than that.
Yes, it’s a modern western with, at its deeply passionate heart, a love story between two men, but somehow the sex of the protagonists almost doesn’t warrant mention. It’s not so much a gay love story as just a love story. And a very beautiful, heartbreaking one at that.
Ranch hand Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and would-be rodeo cowboy Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal) meet when both find work sheepherding on Brokeback Mountain. It’s a long, lonely employment and, over the course of the summer, their somewhat inarticulate camaraderie evolves into a more intimate relationship.
At summer’s end, they go their separate ways. Ennis remains in Wyoming, eking out a living and marrying his sweetheart Alma (Michelle Williams). Jack heads for Texas and the rodeo circuit where he meets Lureen (Anne Hathaway). They marry. Both men are settled and raising families.
It’s less than they silently hoped for but all that they could really expect and four years pass. Then Jack returns through Wyoming, meets up with Ennis and it’s clear that their attachment was not just prompted by lonely nights and a lack of feminine company. It’s love, pure and simple.
As they meet more regularly, Jack realises that this depth of feeling is more important than Lureen and working for his father-in-law. He wants more, to leave the life he’s built and for the two of them to just take their chances. But the taciturn Ennis – for whom this will always be the love that dare not mumble its name – is trapped by the weight of expectation; it might be the 1960s but this is Wyoming not the East Coast and Stonewall is a long way away.
The 60s setting gives this simply astonishing film an unexpected, unsettling depth. The world is changing around Ennis and Jack, leaving them adrift. Their work environment is changing rapidly and there’s a growing sense of aspiration but the changes they need, the shift in attitudes, cannot happen quickly enough.
In simple terms, neither Ledger, Gyllenhall nor director Ang Lee have made a better film, which is about as high as praise gets. It really is that good. An exquisitely acted, subtle tale that gives a strange sense of hope as it simultaneously breaks your heart. There won’t be many better movies than Brokeback Mountain in 2006.
Link to original source:
http://www.megastar.co.uk/dvd/news/2006/01/05/sMEG01MTEzNjQ4MTUxMjc.html 
