17 Years Later, Jake Gyllenhaal Recalls Shooting 'Brokeback Mountain' with Heath Ledger

It has been 17 years since "Brokeback Mountain" broke the taboo of A-list actors playing gay roles. In Ang Lee's Oscar-winning film, Jake Gyllenhaal and the late Heath Ledger played sheep-herding cowboys who develop an emotional and sexual relationship over decades that they keep secret. A critical and popular success, the film won Lee an Oscar for Best Director, and Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana won Oscars for adapting Annie Proulx's short story. Both Gyllenhaal and Ledger were nominated, but did not win. And the film itself lost Best Picture to "Crash" in one of the most famous upsets in Oscar history that some blame on homophobia in the Hollywood community.

Gyllenhaal reflected upon his experiences in making the film in an interview with Vanity Fair. "The relationship between me and Heath while we were making this movie was something that was based on a profound love for a lot of people that we knew and were raised by in our lives," said Gyllenhaal. "A deep respect for their love and their relationship."

At the time, the film faced ridicule along with the critical acclaim, but Gyllenhaal recalled how Ledger ignored it. "There were many jokes being made about the movie, or poking fun at, things like that," Gyllenhaal said. "And [Ledger's] consummate devotion to how serious and important the relationship between these two characters was–it showed me how devoted he was as an actor and how devoted we both were to the story and the movie."

Ledger died in 2008 of an accidental death from drugs. He posthumously won an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for playing the Joker in "The Dark Knight."

Of Ledger's commitment to the role, Gyllenhaal said: "It showed me, I think, how devoted he was as an actor and how devoted he was, and we both were, to the story in the movie. And for us, the experience of the movie, I can say, was a really deep and fun one."

He added that the film took three weeks to make on a very convivial set that Gyllenhaal would like to see more of. "It's a technique of movie-making that I wish we did more of, you know, where we all just powwowed and lived together in a space," he said.

Gyllenhaal said two years ago in an interview with Another Man Magazine that he hadn't yet watched the film.

He explained at the time: "There are things you're chosen for – a quality, an essence – and Ang [Lee, 'Brokeback Mountain' director] did that. And it's still a mystery to me. And something that Heath and I shared: that it was a mystery to us at the time."

Gyllenhaal is currently starring in "Ambulance" in theaters.