Brokeback Mountain Story to Screenplay Reviewed

Screenplay by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, Story by Annie Proulx

Apr 5, 2009

Brokeback Mountain: Story To Screenplay brings together the script of the hit film Brokeback Mountain with the short story by Annie Proulx, but is it worth reading?

Bringing together the much talked about film Brokeback Mountain and the short story as written by Annie Proulx, Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay contains both the original short work of fiction and the script for the Ang Lee directed film as written by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana, as well as essays from all three writers on the experience of making the hit motion picture, or as Annie Proulx calls it in the book, the experience of "getting movied".

Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay carefully contrasts the demands and the allowances considered when adapting any piece of literature for the purpose of a script. The original vision of Brokeback Mountain taken from Annie Proulx's short story collection Close Range is painstakingly recreated for the screen and where the dramatic arcs of film called for adjustments to be made, the inclusion of the script shows how Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry authentically adapted and built upon the framework the short story form of Brokeback Mountain provided.

Further to this, it is intriguing to see how the role of the women in Ennis and Jack's lives were expanded to show how the oppressed, unspoken and often violent love the two men shared spills over into affecting those around them also. Annie Proulx acknowledges as much in her essay, heaping praise on the script that she both anticipated and loathed in the run up to the film's release, and the two are contrasted beautifully in Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay.

Essays by the two script writers Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry read almost like love letters addressed to the story itself, and both talk of their reticence and joy in taking Brokeback Mountain from story to screenplay and making one of the seminal films of the new century.

For one, Larry McMurtry had stopped reading short fiction many years before Diana Ossana practically forced him into looking at Annie Proulx's short story when she presented him with a tattered copy of The New Yorker. It's effect on them both, as documented in the book, is a testament to both Proulx's writing and the haunting semblance of life Ennis and Jack take on in reading or being witness to the film, and this is powerfully captured in Brokeback Mountain: Story To Screenplay.

Larry McMurtry, a published and acclaimed novelist in writing about hard cowboy life himself, is particularly interesting as he orates about the impact the story of two ranch hands who fell in love had on him and the fact that variations of that same story were ones he had often seen over his twenty-some years living in the American West but had not thought to write of himself.

In its essence, Brokeback Mountain is the most private and at the same time universal of tragedies, and McMurtry's essay draws on this theme and tells how this fragile characteristic was brought to life in production, making Brokeback Mountain: Story To Screenplay essential reading for anyone interested in the interpretation of a screenplay to cinematography.

Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay will likely not appeal to everyone's tastes. Indeed, to some it will be superfluous if they have already seen the film or read the short story by Annie Proulx, or own both. But for avid fans of Brokeback Mountain, this really is a must-have for the collection as the contrasts and similarities that are shown by putting Brokeback Mountain the screenplay and Brokeback Mountain the story together are marked and informative.

Especially enjoyable is Annie Proulx's essay on her experience during the making of the film. Her sardonic wit and brutally honest characterisations of Hollywood movie-makers is as entertaining as it is telling, but there is a wider appeal for any one interested in screen writing and the film making world at large, with two seasoned screenplay writers in Diana Ossana and Larry McMurtry making Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay almost like a textbook in the art of adaptation.

Overall, Brokeback Mountain: Story to Screenplay is a concise insider piece for anyone interested in the craft of writing, be it for the screen or in the short story format. It is, at times, touching, and a constantly interesting read, and whilst it is not essential to the enjoyment of either the film Brokeback Mountain or the original short story by Annie Proulx, it is certainly a welcome addition to anyone's literary shelf.

(176 pages; Publisher: Harper Perennial; Date Published: 20 Feb 2006; ISBN-10: 0007234309; ISBN-13: 978-0007234301)

The copyright of the article Brokeback Mountain Story to Screenplay Reviewed in Modern American Fiction is owned by Steve Williams. Permission to republish Brokeback Mountain Story to Screenplay Reviewed in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.