The film purports to convey that gay lovers also encounter challenges from the partner, the family and the society at large as well as other endemic poignancies including envy and parting. The story establishes a parallel between homosexual love and heterosexual love (and the concurrence of both leads to homosexual adultery) while framing the issue from the perspective of the gay lovers. Physiological needs are subordinated to genuine love in the film and Lee brings the sexual acts into mise-en-scene in an overt but appositely mild and restraint manner that just suffices to denote the flagrant hearts of the characters, Ennis Del Mar (Heath Ledger) and Jack Twist (Jake Gyllenhaal). The story frames Ennis as assuming a patriarchal role in the couple's relations.

The story is in very slow pacing with the first 45 minutes in delicately and very minutely depicting the development of the characters' amity which ultimately, but also abruptly under Lee's narrative, transcends to bodily enchantment and homosexual love. Director Ang Lee does not use any inter-title or verbal cues in narrating a movie that spans across a story time of 20 years (1963 to mid-1980s) but uses props and costumes as signifiers on the change in temporal orientation. The occasional presence of Ennis' daughter, Alma (Michelle Williams), over the years further strengthens the narrative in making reference to time. Lee also minimizes the use of verbal elements and uses staging as a signifier in narrating the degree of the characters' love. The covering of Jake's blue jacket by Ennis' white checker shirt (with Ennis' brief soliloquy) in the last sequence is a powerful non-verbal signifier on the depth of the couple's love.

An orthodox cinematography of establishment shots in wide angle is adopted for the beginning of most outdoor sequences. Lee artistically constructs the extreme long (establishment) shots in a way that the demarcation sight line between the sky and the forest ground divides the frames into layers of different brightness and occasionally some establishment mise-en-scenes show either horizontal stripes or diagonal thrusts across the frame (perhaps an implicit signifier of the characters' challenges). The languid mood of the characters is reinforced by the use of lugubrious music in guitar throughout the film. Both characters stage very well and the impression of the scenes is long lasting.