白蘭度在《馬龍 聽我說》中訴說一生風(fēng)云.

　　白蘭度，一個(gè)著名的電影明星，曾主演過很多電影。但是他的一生到底是怎樣的呢?他的一聲又是如何被評價(jià)的呢?

　　When Marlon Brando died in 2004 at 80, more than a few obituary writers decided he hadn’tbeen a contender, after all. For them, this brilliant actor had devolved into as much a loser asTerry Malloy, his punch-drunk boxer in “On the Waterfront,” who is sold down the river and,with a face battered by fights and the pain of a brother’s betrayal, famously eulogizes himself: “I coulda been a contender, I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.”Those who dismissed Brando reviewed his life as if it were some kind of movie, one with astrong opening act, a bewildering middle and a disappointing conclusion deserving of acollective thumbs down.

　　2004年80歲的馬龍·白蘭度(Marlon Brando)去世時(shí)，不少訃告作者認(rèn)為，他終究不是一個(gè)奪冠熱門。在他們看來，這位聰明的演員墮落成了一個(gè)失敗者，就像《碼頭風(fēng)云》(On the Waterfront)里被他打得頭暈眼花的拳擊手特里·馬洛伊(Terry Malloy)。馬洛伊遭到兄弟出賣，他帶著臉上的拳傷和心頭的創(chuàng)傷，卻還稱贊自己道(這句話很出名)：“我本應(yīng)該是一個(gè)奪冠熱門，本應(yīng)是一個(gè)大人物，而不是現(xiàn)在這樣的膿包。”那些否定白蘭度的人像評價(jià)某種電影那樣評價(jià)他的一生——說它開場宏大，中間部分讓人迷惑，結(jié)尾令人失望，應(yīng)該遭到一致否定。

　　That’s the straight world’s take on Brando — call it the revenge of the mediocre on genius —and one reason it’s such a blast to hear the man himself talking about that life in thedocumentary “Listen to Me Marlon.” The movie is almost entirely narrated by Brando, largelythrough snippets of audio recordings that he made over decades. Although it opens with a bitof text about the recordings, it doesn’t explain how the British director Stevan Riley and hiscollaborators got their hands on them. The press notes state that the recordings were“uniquely gifted” to the production company for the movie; a recent article in The Los AngelesTimes suggests a more commercially expedient reason: The actor’s estate, BrandoEnterprises, “decided it was time” for a flick to introduce him to a new generation.

　　那是正統(tǒng)世界對白蘭度的看法——就當(dāng)那是庸眾對天才的報(bào)復(fù)吧——那也是人們在聽白蘭度本人在紀(jì)錄片《馬龍，聽我說》(Listen to Me Marlon)中講述自己一生時(shí)感到震驚的一個(gè)原因。這部紀(jì)錄片幾乎完全由白蘭度講述，主要由他幾十年來的錄音片段組成。雖然開頭的一點(diǎn)文字介紹了錄音的情況，但是沒有解釋英國導(dǎo)演斯特萬·賴?yán)?Stevan Riley)和他的合作者們是如何拿到這些錄音的。出版說明上說，這些錄音是“專門贈(zèng)與”該制片公司以制作這部電影的?！堵迳即墪r(shí)報(bào)》(The Los Angeles Times)不久前的一篇文章道出了一個(gè)從商業(yè)角度講更合理的原因：白蘭度的資產(chǎn)白蘭度公司(Brando Enterprises)“認(rèn)為現(xiàn)在是時(shí)候”拍一部紀(jì)錄片來向新一代介紹他。

　　Whatever the motivations, the movie gives you the opportunity for its loquacious titlesubject to pour his thoughts into your ears for some 100 babbling minutes. This was a catwho could rap, as his longtime friend and former roommate James Baldwin might have said. Themovie is stuffed with boldface names like Baldwin, who (with his pal Norman Mailer) firstencountered Brando in Greenwich Village in the mid-1940s. “I had never met any white man likeMarlon,” Baldwin later said. “He was obviously immensely talented — a real creative force —and totally unconventional and independent, a beautiful cat.” Baldwin said that Brando was“contemptuous of anyone who discriminated in any way,” adding that the actor, aprofessional seducer, made him feel that “reports I was ugly had been much exaggerated.”

　　不管動(dòng)機(jī)是什么，這部紀(jì)錄片讓白蘭度有機(jī)會(huì)用100分鐘的時(shí)間喋喋不休地向你傾訴他的想法。就像他的老朋友、前室友詹姆斯·鮑德溫(James Baldwin)可能會(huì)說的，他是一只會(huì)說唱的貓。片中充滿了大人物，比如鮑德溫。20世紀(jì)40年代中期，鮑德溫(和好友諾曼·梅勒[Norman Mailer])第一次在格林尼治村遇見白蘭度?！拔覐臎]遇見過像馬龍這樣的白人，”鮑德溫后來說，“他顯然極具才華，很有創(chuàng)造力，絕不因循守舊，非常獨(dú)立，像一只美麗的貓。”鮑德溫說，白蘭度“鄙視任何有歧視觀念的人”。他補(bǔ)充說，身為演員的白蘭度極其善于誘惑人，以至于讓鮑德溫覺得“那些說我長得丑的人是在夸大事實(shí)”。

　　There’s not enough of the nonconformist likes of Baldwin in the movie, but then it seemsimpossible to cram an existence as fully lived as Brando’s — which reaches from his Nebraskachildhood to California, New York, Tahiti and beyond — into a few hours. That said, you get asense of that life because, for a celebrity who became known as a recluse in his later years,Brando played the public relations game for a very long time, as the many interview clips show.Some of these are available online, including a 1955 “Person to Person” profile by Edward R.Murrow, which was shot soon after Brando won his first Oscar, for “On the Waterfront.” It’s athoughtful interview, as far as these things go, and Brando plays along nicely, even when hisabusive father, Marlon Sr., whom he loathed, bigfoots into view.

　　片中像鮑德溫這樣不墨守成規(guī)的人不夠多，但是想用幾個(gè)小時(shí)講述白蘭度豐富的人生(從在內(nèi)布拉斯加州的童年到加利福尼亞州、紐約和塔希提島等)似乎是不可能的。盡管如此，這部紀(jì)錄片能讓你對他的真實(shí)人生有一點(diǎn)了解。白蘭度在晚年以離群索居而聞名，但他玩公共關(guān)系這個(gè)游戲很長時(shí)間了，這一點(diǎn)能從很多采訪片段中看出來。你能在網(wǎng)上看到其中一些片段，包括1955年他接受愛德華·R·默羅(Edward R. Murrow)的《面對面》(Person to Person)節(jié)目采訪時(shí)的片段，當(dāng)時(shí)，白蘭度剛憑借《碼頭風(fēng)云》獲得第一個(gè)奧斯卡獎(jiǎng)?？偟膩碚f，那個(gè)采訪很有深度，白蘭度一直友好地配合，甚至在他十分厭惡的曾虐待他的父親老馬龍闖入采訪時(shí)，他依然保持克制。

　　While its subject means that “Listen to Me” is easy to like, Mr. Riley’s shaping of Brando’s wordscan make the movie, every so often, difficult to fully embrace. Mr. Riley’s handling of the fatal1990 shooting of Dag Drollet by Christian Brando, Brando’s son, is especially unfortunate, andthe use of some tabloidlike news material sleazes up the movie a touch. (Mr. Drollet was theboyfriend of Brando’s daughter Cheyenne.) Mr. Riley’s use of a disembodied, floating Brandohead created from digital scans that the actor made in the 1980s is initially amusing, but it’s aneedless distraction, as are the cutaways to murkily lit, messily appointed rooms that areactually re-creations of those in his Mulholland Drive mansion.

　　雖然這部紀(jì)錄片的主題意味著，你應(yīng)該很容易喜歡上它，但是賴?yán)麑Π滋m度話語的塑造常常讓你覺得很難完全接受它。1990年，白蘭度的兒子克里斯蒂安·白蘭度(Christian Brando)槍殺了白蘭度女兒夏恩(Cheyenne)的男友達(dá)格·德羅萊(Dag Drollet)。賴?yán)麑@一事件的處理尤為失敗。另外該片還選用了一些小報(bào)式的新聞材料，拉低了影片的檔次。賴?yán)冒滋m度在80年代進(jìn)行的數(shù)碼掃描做出了沒有身體的、漂浮的白蘭度頭像，這東西一開始讓人覺得挺好玩的，但它沒什么必要，而且會(huì)分散觀眾的注意力。白蘭度穆赫蘭道宅邸里燈光昏暗、布置凌亂的房間的剖面模型，也同樣沒有必要。

　　Brando doesn’t need that kind of embellishment, and neither does this movie. As his admirerJames Dean probably knew all too well, Brando was a true rebel, partly because he thoughtbeing a star was absurd and partly because, as clip after clip shows, he always had a cause,whether it was civil rights, black power, Native American sovereignty or his ownindependence. At its most satisfying, “Listen to Me Marlon” brings you close to a man whoselegacy seems to have been tarnished less by his widely reported (and misreported) actionsthan by an entertainment press that punishes those who ruse to play the game. Brandofound the game ludicrous. But he played along until he didn’t, and while he occasionallysuffered the consequences, along with too many fools, his work outlasts it all.

　　白蘭度和這部紀(jì)錄片都不需要那種裝飾。就像他的愛慕者詹姆斯·迪恩(James Dean)可能非常清楚的，白蘭度是真正的叛逆者，一個(gè)原因是，他覺得當(dāng)大明星很荒誕可笑，另一個(gè)原因是，就像那一段段視頻展示的，他總是在爭取某種權(quán)利，不管是公民權(quán)利、黑人權(quán)利、美國原住民的自治權(quán)，還是他自己的獨(dú)立。最令人滿意的一點(diǎn)是，《馬龍，聽我說》能讓你近距離地了解這個(gè)人。玷污他的精神遺產(chǎn)的不是被廣泛報(bào)道(或錯(cuò)誤報(bào)道的)的他的劣行，而是那些懲罰拒絕服從游戲規(guī)則者的娛樂媒體。白蘭度覺得這個(gè)游戲很荒唐。剛開始他配合，后來他就不配合了。雖然和太多傻瓜一樣，他偶爾要承受這樣做的不利后果，但他作品的生命力將比所有這一切更長久。