巴里

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/barry-lyndon-1975

Stanley Kubrick's "Barry Lyndon," received indifferently in 1975, has grown in stature in the years since and is now widely regarded as one of the master's best. It is certainly in every frame a Kubrick film: technically awesome, emotionally distant, remorseless in its doubt of human goodness. Based on a novel published in 1844, it takes a form common in the 19th century novel, following the life of the hero from birth to death. The novel by Thackeray, called the first novel without a hero, observes a man without morals, character or judgment, unrepentant, unredeemed. Born in Ireland in modest circumstances, he rises through two armies and the British aristocracy with cold calculation.

"Barry Lyndon" is aggressive in its cool detachment. It defies us to care, it asks us to remain only observers of its stately elegance. Many of its developments take place off-screen, the narrator informing us what's about to happen, and we learn long before the film ends that its hero is doomed. This news doesn't much depress us, because Kubrick has directed Ryan O'Neal in the title role as if he were a still life. It's difficult to imagine such tumultuous events whirling around such a passive character. He loses a fortune, a wife or a leg with as little emotion as he might in losing a dog. Only the death of his son devastates him and that perhaps because he sees himself in the boy.

The casting choice of O'Neal is bold. Not a particularly charismatic actor, he is ideal for the role. Consider Albert Finney in "Tom Jones," for example, bursting with vitality. Finney could not possibly have played Lyndon. O'Neal easily seems self-pitying, narcissistic, on the verge of tears. As one terrible event after another occurs to him, he projects an eerie calm. Nor do his triumphs -- in gambling, con games, a fortunate marriage and even acquiring a title -- seem to bring him much joy. He is a man to whom things happen.

The other characters seem cast primarily for their faces and their presence, certainly not for their personalities. Look at the curling sneer of the lips of Leonard Rossiter, as Captain Quin, who ends Barry's youthful affair with a cousin by an advantageous offer of marriage. Study the face of Marisa Berenson, as Lady Lyndon. Is there any passion in her marriage? She loves their son as Barry does, but that seems to be their only feeling in common. When the time comes for her to sign an annuity check for the man who nearly destroyed her family, her pen pauses momentarily, then smoothly advances.

The film has the arrogance of genius. Never mind its budget or the perfectionism in its 300-day shooting schedule. How many directors would have had Kubrick's confidence in taking this ultimately inconsequential story of a man's rise and fall, and realizing it in a style that dictates our attitude toward it? We don't simply see Kubrick's movie, we see it in the frame of mind he insists on -- unless we're so closed to the notion of directorial styles that the whole thing just seems like a beautiful extravagance (which it is). There is no other way to see Barry than the way Kubrick sees him.

Kubrick's work has a sense of detachment and bloodlessness. The most "human" character in "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) is the computer, and "A Clockwork Orange" (1971) is disturbing specifically in its objectivity about violence. The title of "Clockwork," from Anthony Burgess' novel, illustrates Kubrick's attitude to his material. He likes to take organic subjects and disassemble them as if they were mechanical. It's not just that he wants to know what makes us tick; he wants to demonstrate that we do all tick. After "Spartacus" (1960), he never again created a major character driven by idealism or emotion.

The events in "Barry Lyndon" could furnish a swashbuckling romance. He falls into a foolish adolescent love, has to leave his home suddenly after a duel, enlists almost accidentally in the British army, fights in Europe, deserts from not one but two armies, falls in with unscrupulous companions, marries a woman of wealth and beauty, and then destroys himself because he lacks the character to survive.

But Kubrick examines Barry's life with microscopic clarity. He has the confidence of the great 19th century novelists, authors who stood above their material and accepted without question their right to manipulate and interpret it with omniscience. Kubrick has appropriated Thackeray's attitude -- or Trollope's or George Eliot's. There isn't Dickens' humor or relish of human character. Barry Lyndon, falling in and out of love and success, may see no pattern in his own affairs, but the artist sees one for him, one of consistent selfish opportunism.

Perhaps Kubrick's buried theme in "Barry Lyndon" is even similar to his outlook in "2001: A Space Odyssey." Both films are about organisms striving to endure and prevail -- and never mind the reason. The earlier film was about the human race itself; this one is about a depraved minor example of it. Barry journeys without plan, sees what he desires, tries to acquire it and perhaps succeeds because he plays roles so well without being remotely dedicated to them. He looks the part of a lover, a soldier, a husband. But there is no there there.

There's a sense in both this film and "2001" that a superior force hovers above these struggles and controls them. In "2001," it was a never-clarified form of higher intelligence. In "Barry Lyndon," it's Kubrick himself, standing aloof from the action by two distancing devices: the narrator (Michael Hordern), who deliberately destroys suspense and tension by informing us of all key developments in advance, and the photography, which is a succession of meticulously, almost coldly, composed set images. It's notable that three of the film's four Oscars were awarded for cinematography (John Alcott), art direction (Ken Adam) and costumes (Ulla-Britt Soderlund and Milena Canonero). The many landscapes are often filmed in long shots; the fields, hills and clouds could be from a landscape by Gainsborough. The interior compositions could be by Joshua Reynolds.

This must be one of the most beautiful films ever made, and yet the beauty isn't in the service of emotion. Against magnificent settings, the characters play at intrigues and scandals. They cheat at cards and marriage, they fight ridiculous duels. This is a film with a backdrop of the Seven Years' War that engulfed Europe, and it hardly seems to think the war worth noticing, except as a series of challenges posed for Barry Lyndon. By placing such small characters on such a big stage, by forcing our detachment from them, Kubrick supplies a philosophical position just as clearly as if he'd put speeches in his characters' mouths.

The images proceed in elegant stages through the events, often accompanied by the inexorable funereal progression of Handel's "Sarabande." For such an eventful life, there is no attempt to speed the events along. Kubrick told the critic Michel Ciment he used the narrator because the novel had too much incident even for a three-hour film, but there isn't the slightest sense he's condensing.

Some people find "Barry Lyndon" a fascinating, if cold, exercise in masterful filmmaking; others find it a terrific bore. I have little sympathy for the second opinion; how can anyone be bored by such an audacious film? "Barry Lyndon" isn't a great entertainment in the usual way, but it's a great example of directorial vision: Kubrick saying he's going to make this material function as an illustration of the way he sees the world.

我们习惯于称呼电影画面为镜头语言，语言者，可感可叹可哭可喊，如果是特别优美的画面，我们一般认为这是导演的抒情语言，相当于我们朗诵诗歌时发出的“啊～”，啊，长江，啊，黄河，等等，不一而足，张公艺谋的刺客电影被人垢病，就是这种语言太多了，从而显得内容苍白，记得儿时的一次赛诗会，同学的“啊”字后面的省略号太长了，让朗诵者差点背过气去，一时传为笑谈，说明再抒情的声音，也不宜多用，一口气有多长，后面应该是个休止符。

        库布里克的镜头语言是与众不同的，如果张艺谋的《英雄》是“啊”的话，那么库布里克的《发条橙》就是“操！”，装置对比强烈的场景，夸张的人物表演，等等，也是不一而足，不过他的另一部电影《贝利•林登》，却不容易拿一个字来形容，《贝利•林登》的画面是唯美的，像油画一样，在整部电影中，库布里克没用一点辅助光，除了日光，就是烛光，镜头的移动和远近，也是缓慢的，有节制的，构图匀称，把中间的每一幅画面定格，拿出来挂在墙上，都可以算作一幅不错的，十八世纪的庸俗油画，我的感觉就是这样。

        一部电影太讲究形式感，好比一个人穿了名贵的服装，大家对他的着眼点就变了，这个人的自我，就萎缩了，《贝利•林登》的画面太唯美，反而让我看得兴味索然，爱尔兰的山川风物的确美仑美奂，这处凯尔特人大神的居所，具有神圣的地貌，不过，碧绿的草坂，参天巨树，掠夺了我对其中人物命运的关注，更糟糕的是，很多观众喜欢上了里边“史诗般的场景”，说的是战争双方几千人的大场面，其实整个故事讲述的是关于命运，一个人的命运，与山川古堡战争这些只有些许的联系，我们的主人公生活在其中，他才应该是我们关注的主角。

        一名17世纪的爱尔兰青年到底能做些什么？他可以爱上他的表妹，当然他的表妹也可以丢开他与英国骑兵队长订婚，他们都可以吃饱饭而又穿着干净整齐的衣服，说明社会已经文明到可以谈恋爱的程度了，而社会制度也到了可以与情敌决斗的程度，贝利的父亲决斗致死，贝利本人决斗被骗而远走他乡，而贝利与养子的决斗更被导演渲染，成了一出哈姆莱特式的复仇剧，只不过其中的主角成了克劳迪斯而已。在看这部电影之前我看过剧情简介，上面说贝利经过投机钻营而成为贵族，这显然是非常遗憾的对故事的误读，恰恰相反，贝利是经过千辛万苦的投机钻营而混入上流社会，想成为贵族而功亏一篑，最后被养子赶回老家，供以微薄的薪奉，这正是导演借以说明的个人命运悲剧。

一名17世纪的爱尔兰青年到底能做些什么？他可以背井离乡，他可以当兵逃跑再被抓壮丁，他可以在战争结束之后充当间谍，他也可以时来运转而跟着假伯爵大发横财，他由此而混入上流社会，他勾搭地方长官的夫人，并气死长官本人，从而鹊巢鸠占，掌管一座城堡一样的辉煌宫殿，他虐待养子，他宠爱自己的小儿子，但是，他就是得不到梦寐以求的爵位，当他与贵妇人的小儿子堕马身亡之后，他也就失去了在这个家族中的地位，正如他老母亲预言的那样，他在刹那间一无所有了，只能终老乡间，靠回忆过日子。

这部电影改编自威廉•萨克雷的同名小说，这位以小说《名利场》闻名于世的大作家，当然具备森严的法度，这为电影的史诗梦想提供了可能的基础，摄影师出身的库布里克是出名的苛刻导演，他的摄影师经常抱怨他干涉过多，抢走了自己的饭碗，在这一部电影里也是一样，我猜想那些精制的构图都是这么出来的，他在夜里使用大量的蜡烛，古堡如此幽深，人物如此幽怨，大概连演员擦的粉也是来自于几个世纪之前，使得画面完全就是油画的翻版，在71年他的“操”电影招来骂声一片后，75年他的这部“啊”电影终于皆大欢喜，赢得多项奥斯卡大奖。

很多人一说起大师，都会往深奥玄妙上走。其实真正的大师一点也不会故弄玄虚。他们的美妙是你完全能够感受和理解的。


对这部只用自然光和烛光拍出油画感觉的片子，视觉上当然是无可挑剔的，每一个镜头的起始和终止，机位都在它最应该在的地方，平静的视角，让你脱离了那些人物的悲伤、欢乐、荣耀、凄凉，站在一旁，去欣赏大命运的美。

不过如果只谈画面而不谈音乐，这部片就失掉了一半灵魂。

我很惊讶音乐和镜头、节奏以及人物内心世界的默契。碟里带了原声，可惜弄不下来，于是上网疯狂寻了一整天，却无意发现这样一段记录，库布里克看过《西部往事》，对里面先写好音乐再拍电影的方法很欣赏，于是立刻实践到自己的片里，拍摄现场都是一边放着音乐一边表演，听着音乐来找机位，找演员的站位，找移动的节奏。。。


电影何以能被视为一门融合各种艺术形式的而体现价值的艺术，Barry Lyndon是很有力的例证之一。


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