Brokeback Mountain: Brownwood to Wichita Falls Texas

Fans cite merits of the 'cowboy way'
By Bud Kennedy
Star-Telegram Staff Writer

WICHITA FALLS -- In the sparse country where Larry McMurtry has been spinning award-winning cowboy stories for 45 years, a burly oilfield worker knew right away that he shouldn't have gone to see McMurtry's new Brokeback Mountain.
Or at least not in an indigo-blue denim shirt and black cowboy hat.
"Guess I wore the wrong outfit," joked Eddie Zinni, 54, of Wichita Falls, taking off his hat and looking inside the band, as if he might have picked up Jack Twist's by mistake.
Zinni was dressed just like one of the movie's lovesick ranch hands. But that was his only concern as he and a date left the local premiere Friday night at the Cinemark Wichita Falls.
"I always like McMurtry's stuff," he said.
"This was good. It was just -- different."
Twenty miles from McMurtry's hometown of Archer City, his newest cowboy screenplay rode into town Friday night, and by now everybody knows that this Western is different.
It's a movie about two men who long for each other during a 20-year affair, and the resulting toll: betrayal, a heartbroken spouse, neglected children and the anguish of living with a secret the size of a Wyoming mountain.
The local premiere drew a near-sellout crowd, defying a prediction by at least one theater executive.
Jerry Pokorski, the buyer for California-based Pacific Theatres, told the Los Angeles Times last month that Brokeback would be the "must-see" movie of the year, but "maybe in Wichita Falls it will be a different story."
Ingrid Sinclair, 60, of Wichita Falls grew up nearby. She recognized the "cowboy way" of ignoring sexual behavior of any kind, no matter the sex or marital status of those involved. Cowboys invented the idea of don't ask, don't tell.
"I thought it portrayed cowboys pretty well," she said.
"In a small town, things are just kept secret. You know what goes on. You just don't talk about it."
Between the late-night TV jokes, Brokeback has been criticized as a gay-advocacy movie. Yet writer Annie Proulx's original story, shaped into a movie by McMurtry, also fairly depicts the damaged marriage of Wyoming ranch hand Ennis Del Mar and the self-centered roaming of Childress tractor salesman Twist.
Like in any movie these days, there's a sex scene. It isn't particularly vivid.
"I didn't expect to see that, ever," said Beverly Nesbitt, 51, of Wichita Falls, the blond date clutching Zinni's denim sleeve.
"But I liked the movie."
One young moviegoer came out crying.
"It's just a sad love story," said Christine Eisenmann, 21, of Wichita Falls.
She'd never heard of McMurtry.
"It's like any romance," said her friend Kari Leslie, 32. "But we never thought this movie would ever come to Wichita Falls."
The crowd laughed loudly when Del Mar told his wife that he and Twist were just "fishin' buddies."
But mostly, the moviegoers sat in mesmerized silence, either to hear the ranch hands' mumbled, terse dialogue or at the widescreen views of snowy mountain scenery.
Nobody walked out early, and hardly a whisper could be heard the entire showing.
A theater manager said Monday that Brokeback was a box-office hit last weekend, along with Glory Road, a new movie about a national-championship college-basketball team from Texas.
"I think this was a classic McMurtry movie," said C.D. Sinclair, Ingrid's husband and a sales manager for a conveyor-belt-equipment company.
At 60, he is nine years younger than McMurtry. Sinclair was 15 in 1961, when Texans first took note of a young Archer City novelist named McMurtry and his first book, Horseman, Pass By, later made into the movie Hud.
Sinclair said he has read all of McMurtry's 40-plus books and seen all 18 movies, including such classics as The Last Picture Show and the Emmy-winning TV drama Lonesome Dove.
"This fits his work well," Sinclair said. "He's known for writing books with strong women characters. This time, both the romantic leads happened to be men. But they were typical strong McMurtry characters."
Even though he's a McMurtry fan, Sinclair conceded that the movie has "uncomfortable" scenes.
"It's something that you don't see every day," he said. "But it's a very good movie. We would have gone to Dallas to see it."
High praise, coming from someone from Wichita Falls.

Bud Kennedy's column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. (817) 390-7538 bud@budkennedy.com
source: http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/columnists/bud_kennedy/13698866.htm