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He continues, "That's not to say that Brokeback Mountain doesn't have a point of view. It does have a point of view—a profoundly problematic one, one that makes it potentially far more insidious than mere propaganda. All the same, it doesn't commit the artistic fraud of shaping every single element in its story to move the viewer's sympathies in one and only one direction. That sort of one-sidedness is increasingly the single thing that I find most quickly sabotages a film's persuasiveness; nothing else so glaringly announces that the filmmaker himself hasn't really put his own point of view to the test, and doesn't trust the audience to see things his way unless he stacks the deck in his own favor."

Steven Isaac (Plugged In) says, "Taiwanese director Ang Lee … certainly doesn't soft-sell the damage done by the choices Jack and Ennis make. But you don't walk away from Brokeback Mountain thinking about the destructiveness of acting on homosexual temptations. Rather, you're left with the idea that these cowboy-lovers would have experienced none of this pain if only social and moral norms had allowed them to pursue their passion from the get-go."

He points out that the obstacles to Jack and Ennis's relationship are, in fact, good things. "Usually it's a negative thing when people give in to the societal norms around them and give up on their dreams, refuse to step across racial divides, etc. But here, Ennis' reluctance to live with Jack is a good example of how established—biblical—morality within a culture can help people make right decisions. (It isn't a pressure so strong that it keeps him from repeatedly having sex with Jack, though.)"

J. Robert Parks (Looking Closer) says, "If Brokeback's last 90 minutes were as good as its first 45, I'd agree that it's one of the best films of the year. But the last two-thirds … are genuinely disappointing. The biggest problem is that the narrative shifts from covering a summer in almost an hour to traversing 20 years in just an hour and a half. It's like a rock skipping across a pond, hitting the high points of the relationship and then dribbling out at the end."

Mainstream critics hail it as a landmark film, one of the year's best. It appears to be the current front-runner for the Best Picture award at the Oscars.

My full review of Ang Lee's film is online at Looking Closer, along with some reflections on the way that other Christians have received the film.

Andrew Coffin (World) says, "Pundits are hailing Brokeback Mountain … as having the potential to do for homosexuality what Guess Who's Coming to Dinner did for race. The love story it presents is so sympathetic, goes the conventional wisdom, that even denizens of red states will be won over to accept gay love. But the movie is too condescending to ordinary Americans and too anti-marriage to make such an impact."

He adds, "Life with their families is all crying babies, demanding wives, and hard, frustrating work. Gay sex with a kindred spirit in the glorious outdoors is portrayed as so much better. But the symbolism is all wrong. The movie associates homosexuality with nature—magnificent mountains, big sky, clear blue water, teeming forests—as contrasted with the constraints of a tacky, empty civilization."

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We received a huge response from readers to our review of Brokeback Mountain, the controversial new Ang Lee film depicting a gay relationship between cowboys.