Wyoming

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Sometimes I get up in the night, and flip on the TV in the trailer.

Last week, two movies were on at the same time about Wyoming.

Brokeback Mountain and Heaven’s Gate.

I had not seen either, so I looked up the descriptions. I kinda knew that the Gate one was about cowboys and cattle barons, and the Broke one was about a cowboy and another cowboy.

“Brokeback Mountain: A raw, powerful story of two young men, a Wyoming ranch hand and a rodeo cowboy, who meet in the summer of 1963 sheepherding in the high grasslands of contemporary Wyoming and form an unorthodox yet life-long bond, by turns ecstatic, bitter and conflicted.” In other words, gay loving.

“Heaven’s Gate: Michael Cimino's bleak anti-western based on events in 1890s Wyoming. Sheriff attempts to protect immigrant farmers from wealthy cattle barons, and also clashes with a hired gun over the woman they both love. Both men question their roles in the furious immigrant / locals conflict on the American frontier, which winds up in a brutal pitched battle.” In other words, hetero violent.

They probably showed these two movies to honor that famous Wyoming native, Dick Cheney, who will (we hope) be returning to Wyoming in put’ near two years now. The third movie will be a modified version of Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, with a cursing Al Pacino replacing James Stewart. It will commemorate Cheney’s famous salutation to Senator Patrick Leahy on the floor of the United States Senate, “Go f**k yourself.” In other words, … well, actually, I cain’t much improve on those words, I reckon.