藍色情懷

Big Directors Liberated by Small Movies

張佑生譯


迷人、適度、風趣等字眼通常不會讓人聯想到拉斯馮提爾，卻完全符合他嬉笑的新喜劇「The Boss Of It All」。

Charming, modest and funny are not words usually associated with Lars von Trier, but they are exactly right for his playful new comedy, The Boss of It All.

這部片子僅僅五星期就拍完，大部分場景設在一座辦公大樓內，全片敘述一名諧星受僱冒充一位廬山真面目從未被員工看過的公司老闆。

Made in just five weeks, and set mostly in an office building, the film follows a comedic actor hired to masquerade as the owner of a company whose employees have never seen him.

沒有人會料到如此迷人可愛的電影，竟出自這位丹麥導演之手。他在國際影壇嶄露頭角，是1996年那部廣獲好評，情感上卻讓人難以承受的「破浪而出」，近年 來又執導兩部以美國大蕭條年代為背景，陰沉憂鬱的風格化電影，分別是「厄夜變奏曲」（2003）及「命運變奏曲」（2005）。

Such an engaging film is not what anyone would expect from this Danish director whose international breakthrough came in 1996 with the glorious but emotionally grueling Breaking the Waves and who more recently made two bleak, stylized films set in Depression-era America, Dogville (2003) and Manderlay (2005).

這是典型的馮提爾：他正在拍攝中的「反基督」，假定一個由撒旦而非上帝創造的世界，而五月間接受一家丹麥報紙訪問時，馮提爾表示，他從今年初就一直在醫院治療憂鬱症，不知道自己何時才能準備好再開工。

This is typical of Mr. von Trier: His work-in-progress, Antichrist, posits a world created by Satan rather than God, and in an interview in May with a Danish newspaper he said he had been treated for depression in a hospital early this year and doesn't know when he'll be ready to work again.

對照這個淒涼的背景，「真假老闆」顯得順理成章。本片讓馮提爾置身於導演的一個大傳統當中，他們藉由在生涯的關鍵時刻拍攝小品電影而從藝術解放，詭異的是，結果反而往往比他們們雄心顯露無遺、拍片預算膨脹的作品要好。

Against this cheerless backdrop The Boss of It All makes sense. It puts Mr. von Trier in a great tradition of directors who have been freed artistically by making little movies at strategic points in their careers, films that paradoxically often turn out to be better than their overtly ambitious, budget-bloated works.

法蘭西斯柯波拉十年來首部新作是一部預算五百萬美元，獨立資金贊助的「沒有青春的青春」。背景設在第二次世界大戰期間的這部片子具有知性與哲學的主題，由提姆羅斯飾演努力追尋語言起源的教授，幾乎非得拍成比較小品的電影才行。

Francis Ford Coppola's new movie, his first in a decade, is the $5 million independently financed Youth Without Youth. The intellectual and philosophical themes in this World War II-era story, with Tim Roth as a professor grappling with the origins of language, would almost have to make it a smaller work.

這聽起來讓柯波拉感覺輕鬆，他曾說，在與大片商合作多年拍攝商業片賺錢，像是1979年改編約翰葛裡遜原著小說的「造雨人」後，就一直受到女兒蘇菲亞鼓舞，改拍個人自主的電影。

That sounds like a relief to Mr. Coppola, who has said he had been inspired by his daughter, Sofia, to make personal films after years of dealing with studios to make money on commercial works like The Rainmaker, his 1997 adaptation of the John Grisham novel.

經歷「喜劇之王」漫長艱難的製作後，馬丁史柯西斯將1985年的喜劇「下班後」當作快速提神補元氣的調劑。

Martin Scorsese made the 1985 comedy After Hours as a kind of quick rejuvenator following a long, difficult production on The King of Comedy.

葛裡芬鄧恩在紐約熬過一個諸事不順的漫漫長夜，即使現在，仍能感覺到「下班後」的輕快活潑。

The ease and liveliness of After Hours comes through even now, as Griffin Dunne crawls through a New York night during which nothing goes right.

馮提爾從未拍過純粹娛樂的片子，但他仍舊有必要改弦更張，特別是在「厄夜變奏曲」和「命運變奏曲」之後。預計拍三部的「美國三部曲」（又稱「新命運三部曲」）當中的兩部，引發強烈回應；捧他的人佩服他的膽識與藝術技巧，其他人則痛批他是個反美的騙子。

Mr. von Trier has never made movies for pure entertainment, but he still needed to shake up his career, especially after Dogville and Manderlay. Two parts of a projected trilogy, U.S.A. － Land of Opportunities, they evoked such fierce responses that he was lionized by some for his daring and artistry, and reviled by others as an anti-American fraud.

你無須知道「真假老闆」最後如何成為解放他創造力的手段。對他的影迷而言，在我們等待「反基督」時，這部意外驚喜的小品只消吸引住我們的注意力就行。

You don't need to know how it ends to see that The Boss of It All was a freeing step for him creatively. And for his fans this small, unexpected delight will just have to hold us while we're waiting for the Antichrist.

By CARYN JAMES





【2007-06-10/聯合報/C3版/教育】