Typecasting Brokeback Mountain as a “gay cowboy movie” is brutal and unjust to the sheer beauty and vulnerability of the film, as well as the dance of denial and subsequent loss. Ang Lee, who had once considered retirement, was brought back with a bang in his true element by this film which also won him his first Academy Award for ‘Best Director’ in 2006. The film is set in a fictitious yet picturesque location, Brokeback Mountain, and chronicles the lives of two cowboys Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist who are hired by Joe Aguirre in 1963 for sheep-herding. Slowly, the men develop a close, intimate relationship, but the values instilled in them by the heteronormative society prevents them from embracing their true feelings.
Source: https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/brokeback-mountain-impact-on-cinema/