Prison Officer Faces Suspension for Showing 'Brokeback Mountain'
by Margo Williams, 365Gay.com Boston Bureau
April 9, 2006 - 12:01 am ET
(Boston, Massachusetts) A Norfolk State Prison worker faces a disciplinary hearing for allowing inmates at the biggest penitentiary in Massachusetts to watch "Brokeback Mountain" - or at least most of it.
The film was abruptly ended 10 minutes before the closing credits on orders from the warden.
The prison has a contract with a video distribution company and films are shown in the gym, and in the cases of some prisoners shown in their cells.
A spokesperson for the prison system that the warden ordered the movie blackened because it depicted sexual content, but denied that the gay theme of the film had anything to do with the decision.
"Norfolk does not allow the viewing of films with sexual content or violence against prison guards," Diane Wiffin told the Boston Herald.
Wiffin said that the motion picture should have been screened in advance and the worker who was supposed to have done that will be disciplined. That could involve a simple slap on the wrist, a notation in his or her employment file, or a suspension.
The worker, who has not been named, won't get any sympathy from the union that represents prison guards.
"We don't need to foster that kind of atmosphere in there. It already exists," Ken Ferullo, vice president of the Massachusetts Correction Officers Federated Union told the Herald.
"These guys are alone together, some of them forever. We're already running ?'Brokeback prison.
I think that the guard should have gotten a slap on the wrist, but certainly not suspended. Seeing BBM, and understanding the broad range of deep emotional reactions to the film, IMO, it was NOT suitable for a prison population.
I know -- I apologize for being silly. The film has a depth that many will never discover. Too bad. Even some of the dissenting reviewers came off as cold fish, trying to intellectualize the film. It cannot be intellectualized even though there were highly intelligent people behind it, especially Ang Lee. He's proven he is a true auteur (I know, directors kind of hate that label!) He authors movies as much as he directs them.
That's not the only blog/forum on the internet -- this film has spawned as many as Harry Potter and LOTR! It's fun to be able to post one's appreciation of the film without the trolls on IMDb and RottenTomtoe's boards. There's been some real duzzies there -- just mean spirited little weasels who have to close the trailer door to cut the draft when sitting at their PC's. I'm sure none of them have seen the film.
I've was watching the sections that are being discussed on Ultimate Brokeback and, for instance, I was incorrect in the difference between the full screen and wide screen version of the film. The full screen is pan-and-scan, although very well done, and actually shows some visual information at the top and bottom lost on the wide screen.
The 1.85:1 anamorphic theater version has been cropped to fit 16:9 screens. In order to give the viewer as much of the sides of the image, they've sacrificed a bit of the top and bottom.
See the movie is great but many of the guys (mostly on giant egotrips) can't get past the whole man sex thing.... why can't our society just accept it as a serious movie and not distance themselves from it? Are we that square-minded that we can't let a movie be a movie?
Welcome to A2K and the film forum, animalsemily.
I think many straight men consider it a "chick flick," to begin with and that's there excuse so they don't have fess up. It's not the typical woman's movie, unless one wants to characterize all great romantic films that way.
Exactly my point though. Giving a movie the title of being a "chick Flick" puts the movie out as just another romance that only girls watch. But what guys don't understand that it doesn't make you any less of a man to watch two gay guys, nor does it make them gay. Whats wrong with guys today? lol
Larry David wrote a funny letter to the New York Times to that effect -- that he was afraid to go see the movie because he felt he could weaken and become gay.
See male egos... uhhh i am so glad i am a girl and only have to deal with them when they are either buying me dinner or going to my room afterwards.
Yes, straight or gay -- men are just assholes.
True that. Where have all the good men gone is what i like to know. Men who will go to BrokeBack Mountain and not care is it will hurt they precious ego.
well I've seen that movie twice at the cinema (what can I say i don't own DVD's I'm weird like that i like the cinema more) and both times i cried but it was weird because I cried more after the film then during the film.
The second time my mother and I went and we climbed into the car afterwards and cried and cried all the way home, it is a heart wrenching cinematic masterpiece. And boo to all those silly male egos. I can't believe how backward the world has gone of late (ie conservative).
Anyway back to brokeback what a film, it stayed with me for days i even dreamt about, i dreamt I was watching it and crying my eyes out. There is something so tragic about those peoples existence.
That seems to be the response that most people have that liked the film, that it affected them for days afterwards. It's a rare movie that you're still thinking about for days.
I'm proud to say that my boyfriend was just as into the movie as I was, we talked about for a long time afterwards, and he too remarked a few days later that he was still thinking about it.
Actually, a few weeks later we had a big argument, were even talking about breaking up, and he wrote me a note that said he was like Jack and I was like Ennis...
Talk about into it!
I saw Brokeback. A far better Western film was the one called Open Range with Kevin Costner. I really don't think that Brokeback will cause a revolution in American Values. They will hold firm. Despite the fact that the right wing and the Republicans will get murdered at the polls in November, the American public will continue to vote for the Defense of Marriage Act in the many state referendums in November.
Brokeback was a passing fad.
Larry David's letter was not funny. There is massive ignorance concering Homosexuality and its origins in our country. The openly gay genetics expert--Dr. Dean Hamer has shown that all of the research reveals the consensus that homosexuality is based about 50% on genetic causes and 50% on environmental causes. If Homosexuality did not, as a matter of fact, involve environmental triggers, then all of the identical twins, who, of course, come from the same egg would then be gay. As a matter of fact, only about half of the identical twins are both gay.
Environment does play a part. Larry David's letter was not funny!!!
I'm afraid I found "Open Range" ponderous and overwritten -- the script was only average while the performances were first rate. The fact that "Brokeback Mountain" outweighed it heavily at the box office ("Open Range" has yet to make any money even with the DVD and cable), and also the fact that the comparison is questionable -- "Brokeback Mountain' isn't any more of a Western in comparison than "The Last Picture Show."
A fad? Interesting, since the movie has spawned blogs and forums of its own and the DVD sales prove it isn't going to go away anytime soon -- it will remain in film history as a landmark film. Sorry.
As to any anti-gay marriage legislation, that will eventually get tested in the USSC and I think the right-wing religion conservatives will again be dismayed that those laws will be overturned as unconstitutional.
