Jack Twist

In an interview about her work, and "Brokeback Mountain" in particular, author Proulx stated that Jack Twist is a "confused Wyoming ranch kid" who finds himself in a personal dilemma he did not foresee, nor can understand. She said both men were "beguiled by the cowboy myth", and Jack "settles on rodeo as an expression of the Western ideal. It more or less works for him until he becomes a tractor salesman."^[2] Jack is also more romantic than Ennis, being the one who pursues the relationship and insists that they should live together officially. He is open about his desires and discontents, which is also shown in the novella, when he tries to open his wife Lureen Newsome's eyes about their son's dyslexia even though he knows that he has no say in the matter, since she holds the money in the family.

One mystery surrounding Jack Twist (as well as Ennis Del Mar) is his sexual orientation. He has a sexual and emotional relationship with Lureen, but he still shows more sexual desire towards men in general than Ennis, who has no relations with men other than Jack. Jack sleeps with other men, including male prostitutes. While meeting Ennis in the mountains for the very last time, Jack says he is having an extramarital relationship with a woman; however, it is likely that the woman, the "ranch foreman's wife", is actually the ranch foreman himself, as in a previous scene, he invites Jack to a cabin to "do a little fishing and drink some whisky". In a later scene, Jack's father mentions to Ennis that Jack had revealed a plan before he died to come up with a male friend to the family ranch and live there.^[3]

Some film critics suggest Jack is bisexual rather than strictly homosexual. Sex researcher Fritz Klein stated he felt Jack to be more "toward the gay side of bisexuality."^[4] Gyllenhaal himself took the opinion that Ennis and Jack were heterosexual men who "develop this love, this bond", also saying in a Details interview: "I approached the story believing that these are actually two straight guys who fall in love."^[4] The film's producer James Schamus and LGBT non-fiction author Eric Marcus opined that the characters were both gay.^[4]

Interestingly, the story's fame has made Annie Proulx a bit unhappy. She has vehemently been an opposer of fan-written stories that attempt to provide a happier ending for her characters. According to the author, the love story's tragedy makes it realistic. For the writer, a different story would drastically change who the characters are meant to be. That said, Proulx does not seem to have any issues with the movie itself and adores the work done by Ledger and Gyllenhaal.

Novelist Brent Hartinger analyzed some of the discussion about the sexual orientations of the characters, writing for AfterElton.com. Hartinger personally "felt it inconceivable" that the characters could be considered bisexual and not gay because the film consistently showed their dissatisfaction with their heterosexual partners and deep emotional and physical fulfillment with one another. Hartinger added that Del Mar insists on anal sex with his wife, and Twist seeks out other males for sex outside of his marriage when Del Mar is not available. Hartinger puts down efforts to describe the characters as bisexual to a mixture of bisexuals who misunderstand "what it means to be gay" and some who rightfully feel starved of media representations of bisexuality. For Hartinger, the actors' opinions of "straight guys who just happened to fall in love" seems to come more from Gyllenhaal and Ledger's acting method rather than an assessment of the text. Hartinger ended the discussion with a quotation from Proulx, on the subject of her short story, to illuminate the ways in which different people interpret the sexualities of the main characters:

How different readers take the story is a reflection of their own personal values, attitudes, hang-ups... It is my feeling that a story is not finished until it is read, and that the reader finishes it through his or her life experience, prejudices, world view and thoughts.^[5]