Although the contemporary jokes were well done ("We pay every resident money to let oil companies ruin our natural environment), I particularly love the totally meaningless and nonsensical jokes, like the Spider Pig, the "look in your heart" plea, the father-son relationship, the Eski-Moe's in Alaska, the Itchy and Scratchy movie, Grandpa's prophecy and trip to the waffle house, the multi-eyed fish ...
Pigs seem to be in vogue nowadays. Also saw a Hong Kong movie (精武家庭) and there was another pig featured in it for no reason whatsoever...
色・戒 预告片
Simpsons are never too heavy on contemporary jokes. I would not call them totally meaningless though. Jokes like "Eski-Moe's " are funny because there are the buildups for them. The buildup process mostly are done in the tv series since almost everyone in the theatre is a fan. But my friend who had not watched Simpsons before did not find it as funny.
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感慨一把，黄秋生大叔怎么现在这么fit了涅？老当益壮哦，简直是第二青春。过去不是不肯显白贩卖自己的咏春功夫吗？怎么就肯了呢？可见人年轻是不显年轻没关系，到老了也不显老。
再感慨一把，成龙在香港影坛的教父地位恐怕比我想象的还大，虽然职员表没有一个成字（除了制片的英皇标记），处处都是跟他有交情的好几代演员，从午马到自导自演的冯德伦，千丝万缕，几个龙虎武师恐怕也是成家班里出来的。摄影也很有老派武打片的风格，少少吊钢丝，多多hand-to-hand combat，用慢动作拍比较狠恶的动作，切换剪辑不晃不跳，尽量拍全身，很多短打，很多stunts，摔东西砸家具之类的。一看就知道是从警察故事那一派传下来的。让我越看越怀旧。
这两年武打片又开始回来了吗？
＂精武家庭＂虽然号称冯德伦导演，所有的打戏都视觉风格熟悉得不得了，我猜是不是小男生把摄影机交给武指（袁师父挂帅）让老师傅们随便拍去。袁和平终于还是忍不住插进几段看上去很象太极掌的动作，虽然毫无道理（父子女三人应该同一套路的呀）。呵呵。
我旁边坐了一对小恋人，不是印度就是巴基斯坦的。看到reference李小龙的一段，小女生忽然心领神会地吱吱笑起来，让我刮目相看。那么小也知道李小龙哇。
再感慨一把，成龙在香港影坛的教父地位恐怕比我想象的还大，虽然职员表没有一个成字（除了制片的英皇标记），处处都是跟他有交情的好几代演员，从午马到自导自演的冯德伦，千丝万缕，几个龙虎武师恐怕也是成家班里出来的。摄影也很有老派武打片的风格，少少吊钢丝，多多hand-to-hand combat，用慢动作拍比较狠恶的动作，切换剪辑不晃不跳，尽量拍全身，很多短打，很多stunts，摔东西砸家具之类的。一看就知道是从警察故事那一派传下来的。让我越看越怀旧。
这两年武打片又开始回来了吗？
＂精武家庭＂虽然号称冯德伦导演，所有的打戏都视觉风格熟悉得不得了，我猜是不是小男生把摄影机交给武指（袁师父挂帅）让老师傅们随便拍去。袁和平终于还是忍不住插进几段看上去很象太极掌的动作，虽然毫无道理（父子女三人应该同一套路的呀）。呵呵。
我旁边坐了一对小恋人，不是印度就是巴基斯坦的。看到reference李小龙的一段，小女生忽然心领神会地吱吱笑起来，让我刮目相看。那么小也知道李小龙哇。
I saw this trailer too today before "Goya's Ghost" (what a mess of a movie that is). Looks like another exercise in style. Tony Leung looks quite different in this movie -- really getting old.
Tony Leung played a bad guy in the Vietnamese movie Cyclo.
Saw 神经侠侣 on Friday.
Feels quite ... UFO.
The more I think about it the word "Caution" is all wrong. Seriously when it comes down to it, the Chinese title really means "Forbidden Lust". Of course it sounds a lot more graphic but that's what it meant.
Tony Leung played a bad guy in the Vietnamese movie Cyclo.
Saw 神经侠侣 on Friday.
Feels quite ... UFO. The more I think about it the word "Caution" is all wrong. Seriously when it comes down to it, the Chinese title really means "Forbidden Lust". Of course it sounds a lot more graphic but that's what it meant.
这周末去看了Bourne Ultimatum，顺便白蹭了一部The Last Legion。我怎么看怎么象BBC的电视电影，低成本的英国历史打斗片，比Jane Austen改编稍微贵一点。大批熟面孔，Colin Firth, Ben Kingsley, John Hannah, Iain Glen，甚至有Rome里面的Kevin McKidd! 还有一些叫不出名字的，还有世界第一美女Aishwarya Rai。很多漂亮的实地外景哦，不过剧本，嘻嘻，好象在证明英国epic 电影也可以跟好莱坞一样充满了俗套，最后的高潮攻城守城那段简直是全抄LOTR第二集！另外有些桥段颇有点goofy，尤其是Colin Firth跟大美女恋爱的温情段落，和结尾一段。有些地方很有点衔接奇怪的感觉。而且上市前完全没有publicity。既然是Weinstein Company发行的，根据历史经验，我估计是一两年前的英国旧片子，被Weinstein买下来，剪掉大半钟头的胶片，搁置好久，当垃圾扔出来的。艺术什么的当然没有，视觉效果也是少少简陋的CGI。不过我还是挺喜欢的，光看看大批英国演技派的老将们搞些goofy的打斗戏，Colin Firth假装威严的气虚，和Ben Kingsley的bootleg Gandalf 傻样儿，就很好玩了。有些外景还是很美的，不是电脑画出来的。
Bourne Ultimatum比我预计的要好看一些（当然我的预计期望也很低），里面的政治subtext和对现状的评论其实挺多的，但是估计普通观众也不会注意到，连影评都几乎无人提到。只不过极度简化了而已。这种片子对演员不太公平，大家都是一副冷面孔，完全没有发挥余地。后半部里的飞车段落，不知道是不是真的在纽约拍的，说实话我真不太感冒飞车段落了，太多先例，难有创新余地，唯一效果就是提醒我Jason Bourne就是新版The Terminator。麻袋蒙真显老了，而且有发福迹象，才３６岁哎！相比之下，Denzel Washington 都过五十了还跟他在Glory里面的样子差不多，真奇怪。。。
Bourne Ultimatum比我预计的要好看一些（当然我的预计期望也很低），里面的政治subtext和对现状的评论其实挺多的，但是估计普通观众也不会注意到，连影评都几乎无人提到。只不过极度简化了而已。这种片子对演员不太公平，大家都是一副冷面孔，完全没有发挥余地。后半部里的飞车段落，不知道是不是真的在纽约拍的，说实话我真不太感冒飞车段落了，太多先例，难有创新余地，唯一效果就是提醒我Jason Bourne就是新版The Terminator。麻袋蒙真显老了，而且有发福迹象，才３６岁哎！相比之下，Denzel Washington 都过五十了还跟他在Glory里面的样子差不多，真奇怪。。。
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/26/movie ... kI/MjvZiQ#
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August 26, 2007
Love as an Illusion: Beautiful to See, Impossible to Hold
By DENNIS LIM
IN “Brokeback Mountain,” the 2005 critical hit and cultural flashpoint that won Ang Lee an Academy Award for best director, love is a haunting, elusive ideal briefly attained but forever out of reach. Mr. Lee’s new movie, “Lust, Caution,” which will have its premiere at the Venice International Film Festival this week, is also a tragic melodrama, one in which the lovers are up against forces beyond their control, but it takes a harsher view of romance. This time love is a performance, a trap or, cruelest of all, an illusion.
“ ‘Brokeback’ is about a lost paradise, an Eden,” Mr. Lee said this month, taking a break from a final sound-mixing session in Manhattan. “But this one ― it’s down in the cave, a scary place. It’s more like hell.”
Based on a short story by the popular Chinese writer Eileen Chang, “Lust, Caution” is set in the early 1940s during the Sino-Japanese war, mostly in Japanese-occupied Shanghai. The heroine, Chia Chi (Tang Wei), belongs to a university drama troupe plotting to assassinate a collaborator named Mr. Yee (Tony Leung). Assigned to seduce the target, an official in the puppet government, she falls into a desperately physical affair, driven (as the title suggests) by both passion and suspicion. The cast also includes Joan Chen as the grasping, gossipy Mrs. Yee, and Wang Lee-hom, the American-born Asian pop star, as the student ringleader. (The film, which will also be shown at the Toronto International Film Festival next month, is set for release on Sept. 28 by Focus Features.)
Mr. Lee said that when he first read Chang’s story, which she started writing in the ’50s then obsessively revised and eventually published in 1979, it struck him in much the same way as the Annie Proulx story that was the basis for “Brokeback Mountain.” “At first I thought there’s no way I can make it a movie,” he said. But he couldn’t stop thinking about it. “There’s a point where I feel this is my story. It becomes a mission.”
Like Mr. Lee, 52, who was born in Taiwan but has lived and worked in the United States since the ’80s, Chang had a foot in two worlds. Her celebrated early stories and novellas, written in the ’40s, evoked the heady, glamorous fusion of East and West, old and new, that characterized Shanghai before the Communist takeover.
After the 1949 revolution she fled to Hong Kong and then to America, where she continued to write and translate but became ever more reclusive, even as her fame grew throughout the Chinese diaspora. She died in Los Angeles in 1995. Her work has been adapted for the screen by the Hong Kong directors Stanley Kwan (“Red Rose, White Rose”) and Ann Hui (“Love in a Fallen City”).
For Mr. Lee, an astute observer of the warping power of sexual desire and repression (not just in “Brokeback Mountain,” but also in films as disparate as “The Ice Storm,” “The Wedding Banquet” and “Sense and Sensibility”), the allure of “Lust, Caution” lies in the irreducible mystery of its love story, which culminates in a seemingly rash and irrational act. “It’s complex and hard to pin down,” he said. “Maybe it can’t be pinned down.”
To expand Chang’s slender story to a feature-length script (the film, which is in Mandarin, runs two and a half hours), Mr. Lee worked first with Wang Hui-Ling, a co-writer on some of his Chinese-language films, including “Eat Drink Man Woman” (1994) and the martial-arts fantasy “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000). He then turned to James Schamus, CEO of Focus Features as well as the producer of all of Mr. Lee’s films and the writer or co-writer on most of them. Mr. Schamus’s lack of familiarity with Chang’s work was an advantage.
“I didn’t have the innate reverence that I think Chinese readers do,” he said. “I didn’t have to worry too much about suggesting significant changes.”
A grand production on a modest budget of under $15 million, “Lust, Caution” was shot over four months in Hong Kong, Malaysia (standing in for old Hong Kong) and Shanghai. The most ambitious undertaking was a full-scale re-creation, built in only three months on a Shanghai soundstage, of a section of Nanking Road, the city’s commercial thoroughfare, complete with more than 100 storefronts. But above all it was the raw intensity of the intimate scenes that made for a grueling shoot. “We didn’t have to stick our stars 60 feet in the air above a bamboo forest,” Mr. Schamus said, referring to the wire-work ballet of “Crouching Tiger,” “so in that sense it was easier. But especially for Ang this was a much more difficult film. It took him to a place that was really emotional and extreme.”
Mr. Lee’s “Lust, Caution” makes overt the first part of its title, which Chang only hinted at in her lush, stylized prose. “It was very brave of her to fit this story of a woman’s sexual pleasure into a story of war, something so patriarchal and macho,” Mr. Lee said. “How she put that subject matter in this huge canvas ― it’s a little drop but the ripple is tremendous.” He said he felt no obligation to retain the relative discretion of the writing: “In Chinese literature the art is the hiding. But movies are another animal. It’s a graphic tool.”
Accordingly, his film features a few notably revealing and acrobatic sex scenes. (A less explicit cut is being prepared for a possible Chinese release.) These were shot over 11 days on a closed set, with only the main camera and sound personnel present. Leaving room to improvise, Mr. Lee talked through the physical and emotional content of each scene with Mr. Leung (the Hong Kong star best known here for his roles in Wong Kar-wai’s films) and Ms. Tang (who had never before acted in a film). “Ang’s a unique director because he trained to be an actor,” Mr. Leung said by e-mail from China, where he is shooting a film with John Woo. “He’s very quick and intuitive and is always offering his actors something new to work off of.”
The process was harrowing. “We could only shoot for half the day because we’d be exhausted,” Mr. Lee said. “I almost went insane.” But he was convinced of the necessity of the sex scenes. “They’re like the fight sequences in ‘Crouching Tiger,’ ” he said. “It’s life and death. It’s where they really show their character.” He added, “And it’s part of the plot, since it’s all about acting, levels of acting. You’re performing when you have sex.” (At press time “Lust, Caution” had not yet received a rating from the Motion Picture Association of America, but both Mr. Lee and Mr. Schamus said they were expecting an NC-17.)
“Lust, Caution” conjures not just ’40s Shanghai but ’40s Hollywood, summoning the ghosts of film noirs and wartime romantic melodramas. The shadow of Alfred Hitchcock looms large. A poster of “Suspicion” ― which Mr. Lee noted was “the biggest hit of 1942 in Shanghai” ― is glimpsed at one point. “Notorious,” with its intricate entangling of perverse love and espionage business, is the obvious influence (possibly even for Chang, an occasional film critic who wrote screenplays for Hong Kong’s Cathay Studios in the ’50s and ’60s). Mr. Lee cites another touchstone: Josef von Sternberg’s 1931 “Dishonored,” starring Marlene Dietrich as an Austrian secret agent spying on the Russians.
For Mr. Lee, whose parents were exiles from mainland China, “Lust, Caution” resonates on a political level. “It’s about occupying and being occupied,” he said. “The peril here is falling in love with your occupier.” But he was also drawn to the poignant notion that the story, though inspired by an actual assassination plot in the 1930s, incorporated elements of Chang’s own life: a university education in Hong Kong interrupted by war, and a doomed romance with an older man publicly known as a traitor. Chang’s first husband, the writer Hu Lancheng, briefly served in the puppet government and was an inveterate philanderer.
“It was hard for me to live in Eileen Chang’s world,” Mr. Lee said. “There are days I hated her for it. It’s so sad, so tragic. But you realize there’s a shortage of love in her life: romantic love, family love.” He added, “This is the story of what killed love for her.”
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August 26, 2007
Love as an Illusion: Beautiful to See, Impossible to Hold
By DENNIS LIM
IN “Brokeback Mountain,” the 2005 critical hit and cultural flashpoint that won Ang Lee an Academy Award for best director, love is a haunting, elusive ideal briefly attained but forever out of reach. Mr. Lee’s new movie, “Lust, Caution,” which will have its premiere at the Venice International Film Festival this week, is also a tragic melodrama, one in which the lovers are up against forces beyond their control, but it takes a harsher view of romance. This time love is a performance, a trap or, cruelest of all, an illusion.
“ ‘Brokeback’ is about a lost paradise, an Eden,” Mr. Lee said this month, taking a break from a final sound-mixing session in Manhattan. “But this one ― it’s down in the cave, a scary place. It’s more like hell.”
Based on a short story by the popular Chinese writer Eileen Chang, “Lust, Caution” is set in the early 1940s during the Sino-Japanese war, mostly in Japanese-occupied Shanghai. The heroine, Chia Chi (Tang Wei), belongs to a university drama troupe plotting to assassinate a collaborator named Mr. Yee (Tony Leung). Assigned to seduce the target, an official in the puppet government, she falls into a desperately physical affair, driven (as the title suggests) by both passion and suspicion. The cast also includes Joan Chen as the grasping, gossipy Mrs. Yee, and Wang Lee-hom, the American-born Asian pop star, as the student ringleader. (The film, which will also be shown at the Toronto International Film Festival next month, is set for release on Sept. 28 by Focus Features.)
Mr. Lee said that when he first read Chang’s story, which she started writing in the ’50s then obsessively revised and eventually published in 1979, it struck him in much the same way as the Annie Proulx story that was the basis for “Brokeback Mountain.” “At first I thought there’s no way I can make it a movie,” he said. But he couldn’t stop thinking about it. “There’s a point where I feel this is my story. It becomes a mission.”
Like Mr. Lee, 52, who was born in Taiwan but has lived and worked in the United States since the ’80s, Chang had a foot in two worlds. Her celebrated early stories and novellas, written in the ’40s, evoked the heady, glamorous fusion of East and West, old and new, that characterized Shanghai before the Communist takeover.
After the 1949 revolution she fled to Hong Kong and then to America, where she continued to write and translate but became ever more reclusive, even as her fame grew throughout the Chinese diaspora. She died in Los Angeles in 1995. Her work has been adapted for the screen by the Hong Kong directors Stanley Kwan (“Red Rose, White Rose”) and Ann Hui (“Love in a Fallen City”).
For Mr. Lee, an astute observer of the warping power of sexual desire and repression (not just in “Brokeback Mountain,” but also in films as disparate as “The Ice Storm,” “The Wedding Banquet” and “Sense and Sensibility”), the allure of “Lust, Caution” lies in the irreducible mystery of its love story, which culminates in a seemingly rash and irrational act. “It’s complex and hard to pin down,” he said. “Maybe it can’t be pinned down.”
To expand Chang’s slender story to a feature-length script (the film, which is in Mandarin, runs two and a half hours), Mr. Lee worked first with Wang Hui-Ling, a co-writer on some of his Chinese-language films, including “Eat Drink Man Woman” (1994) and the martial-arts fantasy “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” (2000). He then turned to James Schamus, CEO of Focus Features as well as the producer of all of Mr. Lee’s films and the writer or co-writer on most of them. Mr. Schamus’s lack of familiarity with Chang’s work was an advantage.
“I didn’t have the innate reverence that I think Chinese readers do,” he said. “I didn’t have to worry too much about suggesting significant changes.”
A grand production on a modest budget of under $15 million, “Lust, Caution” was shot over four months in Hong Kong, Malaysia (standing in for old Hong Kong) and Shanghai. The most ambitious undertaking was a full-scale re-creation, built in only three months on a Shanghai soundstage, of a section of Nanking Road, the city’s commercial thoroughfare, complete with more than 100 storefronts. But above all it was the raw intensity of the intimate scenes that made for a grueling shoot. “We didn’t have to stick our stars 60 feet in the air above a bamboo forest,” Mr. Schamus said, referring to the wire-work ballet of “Crouching Tiger,” “so in that sense it was easier. But especially for Ang this was a much more difficult film. It took him to a place that was really emotional and extreme.”
Mr. Lee’s “Lust, Caution” makes overt the first part of its title, which Chang only hinted at in her lush, stylized prose. “It was very brave of her to fit this story of a woman’s sexual pleasure into a story of war, something so patriarchal and macho,” Mr. Lee said. “How she put that subject matter in this huge canvas ― it’s a little drop but the ripple is tremendous.” He said he felt no obligation to retain the relative discretion of the writing: “In Chinese literature the art is the hiding. But movies are another animal. It’s a graphic tool.”
Accordingly, his film features a few notably revealing and acrobatic sex scenes. (A less explicit cut is being prepared for a possible Chinese release.) These were shot over 11 days on a closed set, with only the main camera and sound personnel present. Leaving room to improvise, Mr. Lee talked through the physical and emotional content of each scene with Mr. Leung (the Hong Kong star best known here for his roles in Wong Kar-wai’s films) and Ms. Tang (who had never before acted in a film). “Ang’s a unique director because he trained to be an actor,” Mr. Leung said by e-mail from China, where he is shooting a film with John Woo. “He’s very quick and intuitive and is always offering his actors something new to work off of.”
The process was harrowing. “We could only shoot for half the day because we’d be exhausted,” Mr. Lee said. “I almost went insane.” But he was convinced of the necessity of the sex scenes. “They’re like the fight sequences in ‘Crouching Tiger,’ ” he said. “It’s life and death. It’s where they really show their character.” He added, “And it’s part of the plot, since it’s all about acting, levels of acting. You’re performing when you have sex.” (At press time “Lust, Caution” had not yet received a rating from the Motion Picture Association of America, but both Mr. Lee and Mr. Schamus said they were expecting an NC-17.)
“Lust, Caution” conjures not just ’40s Shanghai but ’40s Hollywood, summoning the ghosts of film noirs and wartime romantic melodramas. The shadow of Alfred Hitchcock looms large. A poster of “Suspicion” ― which Mr. Lee noted was “the biggest hit of 1942 in Shanghai” ― is glimpsed at one point. “Notorious,” with its intricate entangling of perverse love and espionage business, is the obvious influence (possibly even for Chang, an occasional film critic who wrote screenplays for Hong Kong’s Cathay Studios in the ’50s and ’60s). Mr. Lee cites another touchstone: Josef von Sternberg’s 1931 “Dishonored,” starring Marlene Dietrich as an Austrian secret agent spying on the Russians.
For Mr. Lee, whose parents were exiles from mainland China, “Lust, Caution” resonates on a political level. “It’s about occupying and being occupied,” he said. “The peril here is falling in love with your occupier.” But he was also drawn to the poignant notion that the story, though inspired by an actual assassination plot in the 1930s, incorporated elements of Chang’s own life: a university education in Hong Kong interrupted by war, and a doomed romance with an older man publicly known as a traitor. Chang’s first husband, the writer Hu Lancheng, briefly served in the puppet government and was an inveterate philanderer.
“It was hard for me to live in Eileen Chang’s world,” Mr. Lee said. “There are days I hated her for it. It’s so sad, so tragic. But you realize there’s a shortage of love in her life: romantic love, family love.” He added, “This is the story of what killed love for her.”
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Accordingly, his film features a few notably revealing and acrobatic sex scenes.
Wah, so juicy!But he was convinced of the necessity of the sex scenes. “They’re like the fight sequences in ‘Crouching Tiger,’ ” he said. “It’s life and death. It’s where they really show their character.” He added, “And it’s part of the plot, since it’s all about acting, levels of acting. You’re performing when you have sex.”
Schamus is Focus CEO now? Yikes. I guess anything Ang Lee makes they will surely distribute. What a nice deal to have your pal do all the producing and marketing -- it certainly gives him total creative control in the entire process.
Tony should have little problem improvising graphic sex scenes though -- he's gone through all that with Leslie Cheung. Doing it with a woman should be a piece of a cake (unless
...).
I'm not particularly interested or fond of the original story anyway and thus am not that eager to see the movie either. Seems to me that Eileen Chang used this story in an attempt to work out (justify?) her own marriage to you-know-who.
Tony should have little problem improvising graphic sex scenes though -- he's gone through all that with Leslie Cheung. Doing it with a woman should be a piece of a cake (unless
...). I'm not particularly interested or fond of the original story anyway and thus am not that eager to see the movie either. Seems to me that Eileen Chang used this story in an attempt to work out (justify?) her own marriage to you-know-who.
That's the problem. The plot vehicle Chang used is so full of cliche and obviously outside of her realm of experience that it's not that original.为啥这影评人写的张爱玲轻松地可以被套进许多框框去呢？去国念国，东方西方，男性女性。简直是一出庸俗电影。
我不认为这是“色・戒”的本意。所以我觉得这个影评人的此种解读是相当不负责任的误导，抓住一些偶然的因素把它们捏在一块，说成因果关系。“色・戒”本来简直是一篇讽剌小说，现在可好，变艳女间谍小说或半自传小说了。Jun wrote:
I'm not particularly interested or fond of the original story anyway and thus am not that eager to see the movie either. Seems to me that Eileen Chang used this story in an attempt to work out (justify?) her own marriage to you-know-who.
http://harps.yculblog.com
搬家了搬家了
搬家了搬家了
这篇小说就是讲的一帮范特西特务活动的学生自发组织的象演戏一样的剌杀行动，被真正的重庆间谍见首不见尾地利用了一把，又被心狠手辣的汪政府大佬轻松收拾掉。女主角做特务本来是票友串戏，结果失身给了不堪的同学，越发的赌气要做一番事业，结果邻了因为易先生一个灯光下的侧影误以为他真爱她，临时改了戏，搭上了自己和全伙人的性命。易先生对付女主角和背后的一伙，不仅是全锅端，他还在自己的心理上把女主角收成了他的伥鬼，成了他枭雄之路的光辉的一笔。因此说，这是一篇十分讽剌的小说。
http://harps.yculblog.com
搬家了搬家了
搬家了搬家了
Eileen Chang's signature style of emotional intimacy and sharp psychological realism happens to fail miserably in a subject she obviously has no direct knowledge about.
It's not only the practical details and character motivation that seem false in the story, but also the injected romantic center that fails within the overall tone of a story like this. Just doesn't jibe with the material at all. And not believable.
Of course there is novelty about the story -- a cross-genre author attempting at a thriller plot and the favorite catch-phrase "Inspired by a True Story"!
It's not only the practical details and character motivation that seem false in the story, but also the injected romantic center that fails within the overall tone of a story like this. Just doesn't jibe with the material at all. And not believable.
See, this plot not only trivializes the source material and the individuals, but also carry no credibility on its own. Rather, such absurdity might reflect (very vaguely of course) a certain underlying inclination of the author's own ... baggage? unresolved issue?女主角做特务本来是票友串戏，结果失身给了不堪的同学，越发的赌气要做一番事业，结果邻了因为易先生一个灯光下的侧影误以为他真爱她，临时改了戏，搭上了自己和全伙人的性命。
Of course there is novelty about the story -- a cross-genre author attempting at a thriller plot and the favorite catch-phrase "Inspired by a True Story"!
就像洗了个热水澡
《色・戒》，本来写的就是“色”，其他的都是壳儿而已。就连“戒”，也是反过来强调“色”。
其实，是特殊时期的少女性心理史。
其实，是特殊时期的少女性心理史。
羊毛出在羊身上――谈《色・戒》
拙著短篇小说《色・戒》，这故事的来历说来话长，有些材料不在手边，以后再谈。看到十月一日的《人间》上域外人先生写的《不吃辣的怎么胡得出辣子？――评＜色，戒＞》一文，觉得首先需要阐明下面这一点：
特务工作必须经过专门的训练，可以说是专业中的专业，受训时发现有一点小弱点，就可以被淘汰掉。王佳芝凭一时爱国心的冲动――域文说我“对她爱国动机全无一字交代”，那是因为我从来不低估读者的理解力，不作正义感的正面表白――和几个志同道合的同学，就干起特工来了，等于是羊毛玩票。羊毛玩票人了迷，捧角拜师，自组票社彩排，也会倾家荡产。业余的特工一不小心，连命都送掉。所以《色・戒》里职业性的地下工作者只有一个，而且只出现了一次，神龙见首不见尾，远非这批业余的特工所能比。域外人先生看书不够细心，所以根本“表错了情”。
“007”的小说与影片我看不进去，较写实的如詹・勒卡瑞(Jonh Lecarre)的名著《＜冷战中＞进来取暖的间谍》――搬到银幕也是名片――我太外行，也不过看个气氛。里面的心理描写很深刻，主角的上级首脑虽是正面人物，也口蜜腹剑，牺牲个把老下属不算什么。我写的不是这些受过专门训练的特工，当然有人性，也有正常的人性的弱点，不然势必人物类型化。
王佳芝的动摇，还有个原因。第一次企图行刺不成，赔了夫人又折兵，不过是为了乔装已婚妇女，失身于同伙的一个同学。对于她失去童贞的事，这些同学的态度相当恶劣――至少予她的印象是这样――连她比较最有好感的邝裕民都未能免俗，让她受了很大的刺激。她甚至于疑心她是上了当，有苦说不出，有点心理变态。不然也不至于在首饰店里一时动心，铸成大错。
第二次下手，终于被她勾搭上了目标。她“每次跟老易在一起都像洗了个热水澡，把积郁都冲掉下，因为一切都有了个目的”。“因为一切都有了个目的”，是说“因为没自牺牲了童贞”，极其明显。域外人先生断章取义，撇开末句不提，说：我未干过间谍工作，无从揣摩女间谍的心理状态。但和从事特工的汉奸在一起，会像“洗了个热水澡”一样，把“积郁都冲掉了”，实在令人匪夷所思。
王佳芝演话剧，散场后兴奋得松弛不下来，大伙消夜后还拖着个女同学陪她乘电车游车河，这种心情，我想上台演过戏，尤其是演过主角的少男少女都经验过。她第一次与老易同桌打牌，看得出他上了钩，回来报告同党，觉得是“一次空前成功的演出，下了台还没下妆，自己都觉得顾盼间光艳照人。她舍不得他们走，恨不得再到哪里去。已经下半夜了，邝裕民他们又不跳舞，找那种通宵营业的小馆子去吃及第粥也好，在毛毛雨里老远一路走回来，疯到天亮。”
自己觉得扮戏特别美艳，那是舞台的魅力。“舍不得他们走”是不愿失去她的观众，与通常的 the party is over酒阑人散的碉帐。这种留恋与施亥同学夜游车河一样天真。“疯到天亮”也不过是凌晨去吃小馆子，雨中步行送两个女生回去而已。域外人先生不知道怎么想到歪里去了：
我但愿是我错会了意，但有些段落，实在令我感到奇怪。例如她写王
佳芝第一次化身麦太太，打入易家，回到同伙处，自己觉得是“一次空前
成功的演出，下了台还没下妆，自己都觉得顾盼间光艳照人。她舍不得他
们走，恨不得再到哪里去。”然后又“疯到天亮”。那次她并未得手，后
来到了上海，她又“义不容辞”再进行刺杀易先生的工作。照张爱玲写来，
她真正的动机却是“每次跟老易在一起都像洗了个热水澡，把积郁都冲掉
了，因为一切都有了(缺“个”字)目的。”
句旁着重点是我代加。“回到同伙处”显指同伙都住在“麦家”。他们是岭南大学学生，随校迁往香港后，连课堂都是借港大的，当然没有宿舍，但是必定都有寓所。“麦家”是临时现找的房子，香港的小家庭都是佐公寓或是一个楼面。要防易家派人来送信，或是易太大万一路过造访，年轻人大多令人起疑，绝不会大家都搬进来同住，其理甚明。这天晚上是聚集在这里“等信”。
既然算是全都住在这里，“舍不得他们走”就不是舍不得他们回去，而成了舍不得他们离开她各自归寝。引原文又略去舞场已打烊，而且邝裕民等根本不跳舞――显然因为态度严肃――惟有冒雨去吃大排档一途。再代加“然后又”三字，成为“然后又疯到天亮”，“疯到天亮”就成了出去逛了回来开无遮大会。
此后在上海跟老易每次“都像洗了个热水澡，把积郁都冲掉了，因为一切都有了‘个’目的”，引原文又再度断章取义，忽视末句，把她编派成色情狂。这才叫罗织人人于罪，倒反咬一口，说我“罗织她的弱点”。
一般写汉奸都是獐头鼠目，易先生也是“鼠相”，不过不像公式化的小说里的汉奸色迷迷晕陶陶的，作饵的侠女还没到手已经送了命，侠女得以全贞，正如西谚所谓“又吃掉蛋糕，又留下蛋糕”。他唯其因为荒淫纵欲贪污，漂亮的女人有的是，应接不暇，疲于奔命，因此更不容易对付。而且虽然“鼠相”，面貌仪表还不错士―这使域外人先生大为骇异，也未免太“以貌取人”了。――这一点非常重要，因为他如果是个“糟老头子”(见水晶先生《色・戒》书评)，给王佳芝买这只难觅的钻戒本来是理所当然的，不会使她抨然心动，以为“这个人是真爱我的”。
易先生的“鼠相”“据说是主贵的”，(《色・戒》原文)“据说”也者，当是他贵为伪政府部长之后，相士的恭维话，也可能只是看了报上登的照片，附会之词。域外人先生写道：“汉奸之相‘主贵’委实令我不解。”我也不解。即使域外人先生写信命相，总也不至于迷信中认为一切江湖相士都灵验如神，使他无法相信会有相面的预言伪部长官运亨通，而看不出他这官做不长。
此外域文显然提出了一个问题：小说里写反派人物，是否不应当进入他们的内心？杀人越货的积犯一定是自视为恶魔，还是可能自以为也有逼上梁山可歌可控的英雄事迹？
易先生思将仇报杀了王佳芝，还自矜为男子汉大丈夫。起先她要他同去首饰店，分明是要敲他一记。他“有点悲哀。本来以为想不到中年以后还有这样的奇遇。……不让他自我陶醉一下，不免抚然。”此后她捉放曹放走了他，他认为“她还是爱他的，是他生平第一个红粉知己。想不到中年以后还有这番遇合。”这是枪毙了她以后，终于可以让他尽量“自我陶醉”了，与前如出一辙，连字句都大致相同。
他并且说服了自己：“得一知己，死而无憾。他觉得她的影子会永远依傍他，安慰他。……他们是原始的猎人与猎物的关系，虎与张的关系，最终极的占有。她这才生是他的人，死是他的鬼。”
域外人先生说：“读到这一段，简直令人毛骨惊然。”“毛骨惊然”正是这一段所企图达到的效果，多谢指出，给了我很大的鼓励。
因为感到毛骨慷然，域外人先生甚至于疑惑起来：也许，张爱玲的本意还是批评汉奸的？也许我没有弄清楚张爱玲的本意？
但是他读到最后一段，又翻了案，认为是“歌颂汉奸的文学――即使是非常暖昧的歌颂――”。
故事未了，牌桌上的三个小汉奸太太还在进行她们无休无歇的敲竹杠要人家请吃饭。无聊的鼓噪歪缠中，有一个说了声：“不吃辣的怎么胡得出辣子？”一句最浅薄的谐音俏皮话。域外人先生问：
这话是什么意思？辣椒是红色的，“吃辣”就是“吃血”的意思，这是很明显的譬喻。难道张爱玲的意思是说，杀人不眨眼的汉奸特务头子，只有“吃辣”才“胡得出辣子”，做得大事业？这样的人才是“主贵”的男子汉大丈夫？
“辣椒是红色的，‘吃辣’就是‘吃血’的意思。”吃红色食品就是“吃血”，那么吃番茄也是吃血？而且辣的食物也不一定是辣椒，如粉蒸肉就用胡椒粉，有黑白二种。
我最不会辩论，又写得慢，实在匀不出时间来打笔墨官司。域外人这篇书评，貌作持平之论，读者未必知道通篇穿凿附会，任意割裂原文，予以牵强的曲解与“想当然耳”：一方面又一再声明“但愿是我错会了意”，自己预留退步，可以归之于误解，就可以说话完全不负责。我到底对自己的作品不能不负责，所以只好写了这篇短文，下不为例。
(原刊1978年11月27日台北《中国时报・人间》)
Violent delights.
就算是写色，也十分失败，一个女孩子因为失了身（完全没有失身的circumstance，强迫的还是引诱的？）而自暴自弃，而跟汉奸老男人上床，也搞不清是享受了还是麻木的，老男人给她的是爱抚还是抵触的感受（这一点很重要），读者对王佳芝的心理仍然一团迷雾中，就胡里胡图地接受她突然因爱而反悔救他一命的戏剧性高潮。性爱，尤其是年轻女孩子刚开始发生身体关系，是很细腻婉转，没有逻辑但是非常敏感和复杂的过程，totally intuitive and complicated。别忘了，王佳芝是个颇早熟的女孩子，就算没有性经验，跟男人男孩子之间的非身体交流已经很久，恰好不是充满罪恶感的超级纯情处女的类型。这些地方张爱玲写得通通都很vague and hollow，但是vague and hollow并不能遮过不合情理的地方。而且这情节底下的assumption让我想起金庸最喜欢的桥段：女人跟谁上了床就心里对谁忠诚，哪怕她并非因为爱情而＂失身＂。在金庸笔下当然是处女，不过王佳芝的例子也一样说服不了我，一样让我别扭得要命。钻石云云，更让我恶心。原来给女人买钻石就是爱情的最有力证明了。哈！
至于业余特工的部分，更加make no sense。就算是玩票的，总得搞到枪，安排步骤，等等过程细节吧？那个不见首尾的职业特工总有参与吧？根本看不出原定的刺杀计划是怎样的，为什么不在进珠宝店或者在店里进行，而要等他出门上车前。大白天的在街上刺杀，简直是疯了。业余搞这件事，最难的一步是什么？pulling the trigger，没有杀过人的家伙，根本下不了手，所以动手的非得是那个职业的特工不可，而职业特工怎么会那么笨，那么没用？还＂贴身开枪＂呢，就算是一直盯着等他出来，近距离居然连一枪也没开出来，这职业的似乎比业余的还烂。
看过The Godfather没有？里面那杀人是怎么杀的，Michael在公众场合对着人脑门，砰砰砰。
就算是我这样毫无实战经验的人，也能编出比这可信一百倍的计划来。王佳芝跟老头约会不是吗？留着门不锁，半夜放人进来，趁他睡着时砰砰砰。为什么杀人一定要在室外？简直可笑。而且他跟情人幽会一定不带保镖。
至于业余特工的部分，更加make no sense。就算是玩票的，总得搞到枪，安排步骤，等等过程细节吧？那个不见首尾的职业特工总有参与吧？根本看不出原定的刺杀计划是怎样的，为什么不在进珠宝店或者在店里进行，而要等他出门上车前。大白天的在街上刺杀，简直是疯了。业余搞这件事，最难的一步是什么？pulling the trigger，没有杀过人的家伙，根本下不了手，所以动手的非得是那个职业的特工不可，而职业特工怎么会那么笨，那么没用？还＂贴身开枪＂呢，就算是一直盯着等他出来，近距离居然连一枪也没开出来，这职业的似乎比业余的还烂。
看过The Godfather没有？里面那杀人是怎么杀的，Michael在公众场合对着人脑门，砰砰砰。
就算是我这样毫无实战经验的人，也能编出比这可信一百倍的计划来。王佳芝跟老头约会不是吗？留着门不锁，半夜放人进来，趁他睡着时砰砰砰。为什么杀人一定要在室外？简直可笑。而且他跟情人幽会一定不带保镖。
No kidding.较写实的如詹・勒卡瑞(Jonh Lecarre)的名著《＜冷战中＞进来取暖的间谍》――搬到银幕也是名片――我太外行，也不过看个气氛。
Ah, I wasn't defending the story or commenting on the plot. I myself couldn't understand the "hot shower" part either...Jun wrote:就算是写色，也十分失败，一个女孩子因为失了身（完全没有失身的circumstance，强迫的还是引诱的？）而自暴自弃，而跟汉奸老男人上床，也搞不清是享受了还是麻木的，老男人给她的是爱抚还是抵触的感受（这一点很重要），读者对王佳芝的心理仍然一团迷雾中，就胡里胡图地接受她突然因爱而反悔救他一命的戏剧性高潮。性爱，尤其是年轻女孩子刚开始发生身体关系，是很细腻婉转，没有逻辑但是非常敏感和复杂的过程，totally intuitive and complicated。别忘了，王佳芝是个颇早熟的女孩子，就算没有性经验，跟男人男孩子之间的非身体交流已经很久，恰好不是充满罪恶感的超级纯情处女的类型。这些地方张爱玲写得通通都很vague and hollow，但是vague and hollow并不能遮过不合情理的地方。而且这情节底下的assumption让我想起金庸最喜欢的桥段：女人跟谁上了床就心里对谁忠诚，哪怕她并非因为爱情而＂失身＂。在金庸笔下当然是处女，不过王佳芝的例子也一样说服不了我，一样让我别扭得要命。钻石云云，更让我恶心。原来给女人买钻石就是爱情的最有力证明了。哈！
至于业余特工的部分，更加make no sense。就算是玩票的，总得搞到枪，安排步骤，等等过程细节吧？那个不见首尾的职业特工总有参与吧？根本看不出原定的刺杀计划是怎样的，为什么不在进珠宝店或者在店里进行，而要等他出门上车前。大白天的在街上刺杀，简直是疯了。业余搞这件事，最难的一步是什么？pulling the trigger，没有杀过人的家伙，根本下不了手，所以动手的非得是那个职业的特工不可，而职业特工怎么会那么笨，那么没用？还＂贴身开枪＂呢，就算是一直盯着等他出来，近距离居然连一枪也没开出来，这职业的似乎比业余的还烂。
看过The Godfather没有？里面那杀人是怎么杀的，Michael在公众场合对着人脑门，砰砰砰。
就算是我这样毫无实战经验的人，也能编出比这可信一百倍的计划来。王佳芝跟老头约会不是吗？留着门不锁，半夜放人进来，趁他睡着时砰砰砰。为什么杀人一定要在室外？简直可笑。而且他跟情人幽会一定不带保镖。
No kidding.较写实的如詹・勒卡瑞(Jonh Lecarre)的名著《＜冷战中＞进来取暖的间谍》――搬到银幕也是名片――我太外行，也不过看个气氛。
只是这个色，我看才是小说的主线。张奶奶应该也是这个意思。至于写没写出来，那是另外的事。
《色戒》跟张的几个名作比起来，当然不算好啦。她的这个辩解，也只是就一些小细节，做几个小反击。张的这个调调，写隐暗细腻的性心理，本来是无从发挥的。当然我对少女性心理也一无所知啦。
Violent delights.
