Marking Time

Having read some reviews I was expecting alot more from this. It’s the classic story of forbidden love with the twist that this time it’s gay cowboys. It’s an interesting enough premise but the movie doesn’t take it anywhere. The characters are barely sketched and rarely rise above stereotypes. The actors do a good job despite being limited by the material. I was hoping for more of an exploration of the relationships that the two lovers had with their wives and families, and the broader society, but like everything else in the film these areas were barely touched on and quickly drawn with a few clichés. A lost opportunity.

And the pacing is terrible. As soon as any momentum starts to build we’re whisked forward five years and have to readjust ourselves to where the characters are now, trying to fill in the blanks of what happened in the meantime. Playing a Steve Earle song from 1988 in a bar in 1978 doesn’t do much for the timetravel sickness either.

I was expecting something with the power of Desert Hearts but I just left the cinema saying ’so what’. Sure, unfulfilled dreams and love lost are guaranteed to pull the heart strings but you have to do something more to make an original and interesting story. This just didn’t do it for me. It’ll probably sweep the Oscars.