影评—Crash 撞车
在第78届奥斯卡奖颁奖晚会上,Crash击败此前呼声甚高的《断背山》夺得最佳影片奖,并将最佳剧本和最佳剪辑奖也收入囊中。作为美国最受关注的奖项,这个结果并不算出人意料,因为比起《断背山》,它探讨的是影响更为广泛的美国种族问题,这也是美国的核心社会问题。影片通过几条平行的线索和各个线索间环环相扣的情节,把众多的人物放置在一个庞大的系统之中。在紧张的剧情发展中,展现了洛杉矶这个移民城市中各种族人群在几十小时之内发生的相互碰撞和冲突,并展现了这其中人们的各种复杂感情。
黑白问题
片名Crash既指影片开头和结尾的撞车事件,也暗示各族裔人群发生的冲撞。影片开头,加州的高速路上两车相撞,车上的亚洲人和拉美裔女侦探互相指责并拿对方的种族开涮,车里的黑人检察官淡淡说道:You brush pass people. People bump into you. In L. A., nobody touches you. We are always behind this metal and class. I think we miss that touch so much that we crash into each other just so we can feel something. 由此拉开一幕加州洛杉矶的种族画卷。
美国传统种族问题的核心就是黑白问题,由于历史上的奴隶制度,美国主要的少数民族优惠政策是以黑人为主要对象的。在本片中黑白问题也占了相当大的部分。在美国,白人与黑人之间的贫富悬殊已经存在了几百年。面对这种情况,黑人社区在抗争的过程中也分裂成不同的群体,一部分黑人对白人社会极端仇视,在一种对现实的绝望和自暴自弃中产生了黑人的犯罪文化。就像影片中两个街头黑人青年,他们仇视白人的一切,并以抢劫白人为乐。在他们眼中,似乎任何东西都是白人歧视黑人的表现,连公共汽车他们也认为是用来“to humiliate the people of color who are reduced to riding on them.”
看到对面的白人夫妇对他们警惕的眼神,黑人青年Anthony大发牢骚:Man, look around you, man. You couldn't find a whiter, safer or better-lit part of the city right now. But yet this white woman sees two black guys who look like UCLA students strolling down the sidewalk, and her reaction is blind fear? Look at us. Are we dressed like gangbangers? Huh? No. Do we look threatening? No. Fact. If anybody should be scared around here, it's us! We're the only two black faces surrounded by a sea of over-caffeinated white people patrolled by the trigger-happy LAPD(洛杉矶警局). So you tell me . Why aren't we scared?
讽刺的是,他们刚说自己doesn't look threatening,就掏枪抢劫了白人夫妇的汽车。而在抱怨白人歧视的同时,他们又歧视着其他族裔。片中两人在撞倒一名亚裔男子时就不停使用chinaman这一侮辱性的词语。
而另一部分黑人则获得成功,渴望进入主流社会,但这是一个颇令人挣扎的过程。他们常常为自己的黑人身份困扰,为自己黑人同胞的犯罪行径羞愧,因此不愿意与自己出身的黑人社区有什么瓜葛,进而常常被自己的社区甚至家庭视为背叛者。影片中的黑人电视导演Cam和黑人检察官Graham就是如此。
作为一名成功的导演,Cam由于自己的黑人身份遭到白人警察Ryan的羞辱(也许就像他妻子后来说的那样有点shamed to be black),他没有奋起维护自己的尊严,但这给他留下了深深的伤害。正当心烦意乱之际,他又遭到Anthony的抢劫,这次他奋起反抗,并与随后到来的白人警察对峙。一场风波过去,他对Anthony说了这样一句:“Look at me. You embarrass me. You embarrass yourself,”颇能代表成功黑人的心声。
黑人检察官Graham则是一个家庭分裂的例子。Graham有一个不成器的弟弟流落街头,母亲让他去找找弟弟,他则一直以busy推托。但他还是回家看望了母亲,后来又因为弟弟的缘故,放弃追查一起黑人警官被射杀的案件。但母子间的距离还是很遥远,当他弟弟被打死、抛尸路边时,他和母亲一起去收尸,母子间的对话是这样的:
Graham: Mom, I promise you... I promise I'm gonna find out who did this, Mom.
Graham's mom: Oh, I already know. You did. I asked you to find your brother, but you were busy. We weren't much good to you anymore, were we? You got things to do. You go ahead. I'll sign the papers.
一句“We weren't much good to you”表现黑人家庭内部的复杂感情。看着Graham黯然离去的背影,很能体会他内心的苦楚。
影片中另一个黑人成功人士——警察局长也处在种族的夹缝之中。当警官Ryan的搭档因看不惯Ryan侮辱黑人的行为而向他申诉时,他这样回答:I'm sure you understand how hard a black man has to work to get to, say, where I am, in a racist fucking organization like the LAPD, and how easily that can be taken away. Now, that being said, it's your decision. You can put your career and mine on the line in pursuit of a just cause, or you can admit to having an embarrassing problem of a personal nature.
美国社会解决种族间悬殊贫富差距的主要方法就是采取向少数民族倾斜、优惠的政策,但数十年下来,这些政策并不能消除种族间的贫富差别,反而加深了部分白人对少数族裔的敌意。影片中,导演隐晦地对这种制度的作用提出了质疑。警官Ryan这个角色就是如此,他对黑人的敌意就是由父亲的公司因为政府将合同转包给少数民族而破产,父亲由此饱受病痛折磨而生,他这样对黑人医保顾问这样说道:
Ryan: My father doesn't deserve like this. He was a janitor. He struggled his whole life, saved enough to start his own company, twenty-three employees, all of them black, paid them equal wages when no one else was doing that. For 30 years he worked side by side with those men, sweeping and carrying garbage. Then the city council decides to give minority-owned companies preference in city contracts. And overnight, my father loses everything, his business, his home, his wife, everything. Not once does he blame your people.
但用“you people”这样敏感的种族指示词,加上他言谈中刻意流露出的对少数族裔的愤怒,黑人顾问还是拒绝了他给父亲换医生的申请。而Ryan则把怒火转向了其他黑人。两个种族间的敌意和隔阂也在互相伤害中加深了。
其他族裔
影片中除了黑人,也穿插着大量其他少数族裔,比如拉美人和亚洲人。其实美国最大的少数族裔是拉美人(Latino或 Hispanic),他们来自以墨西哥为主的拉丁美洲,虽然在人类学上他们属于白种人,但在文化上,却被归类为people of color(有色人种),不属于white man的范畴。
比起亚洲人,他们和白人在文化上更加接近,由于他们移民历史较长,生育率也较高,他们的英文水平较亚裔高,对主流文化的介入也较深。但和亚裔一样,他们也面临身份模糊化的危险,被美国社会所脸谱化。比如,拉美人无论来自哪个国家,常常被统称为Mexican,片中Graham甚至连自己拉美女友的种族背景都不清楚,这让女友很愤怒:“My father's from Puerto Rico. My mother's from El Salvador. Neither one of those is Mexico.”
另一个拉美人锁匠Daniel则因为自己的装束被地区检察官的太太Jean当作罪犯看待,Jean把他形容为“the guy with the shaved head, the pants around his ass, the prison tatto(刺青)”。
亚裔得到的待遇则更甚,他们不甚流利的英语常常成为对方揶揄的对象,开杂货铺的伊朗人由于长得像阿拉伯人,被白人枪店老板讥讽:
Gun shop owner: Yo, Osama(拉登)! Plan a jihad(圣战) on your own time. What do you want?
Iranian father: Are you insulting at me?
Gun shop owner: Am I making insult “at”you? Is that the closest you can come to English?
Iranian father: Yes, I speak English! I am American citizen.
Gun shop owner: Oh, God, here we go.
Iranian father: I have rights like you. I have rights to buy gun.
Gun shop owner: Not in my store. Andy, get him out.
这里,伊朗人因为自己insult at的语法错误而遭人奚落,后来更是因为被误认为是阿拉伯人,自己的商店遭到打劫与涂鸦。而影片开头,与人撞车的华人也因为把brake的读者发成blake而受到Graham拉美裔女友的嘲笑。
相对而言,白人形象则有点高高在上的感觉。地区检察官Rick只关心种族问题对自己前途的影响;Rick的妻子Jean因为汽车被黑人青年偷走而迁怒于其他少数族裔;枪店老板对伊朗人赤裸裸的恶言相向;黑车店老板只关心金钱。
比较特别的是两个白人警官,Ryan因为父亲疾病缠身而把烦恼发泄到路遇的黑人身上,而正义感很强的青年警官Hansen则很看不过眼,之后在枪口下救下Cam。但他内心还是不自主地对黑人存在偏见,当Graham的弟弟因为发现他与自己一样有一个圣母小像而发笑时,他以为那是在嘲笑自己,就在黑人青年要掏出圣母像澄清时,他本能地以为是他在掏枪而开枪打死了黑人青年。看到这儿,真让人有点歧视无处不在的感觉。
种族和解
值得注意的是片中的冲撞和摩擦并不是单向的,而是相互交错在一起,也不只是偏见、歧视和仇恨,而是各种感情的交织,充满了生活的真实气息。在某种程度上,每个人既是受害者,又是施害者,影片中的各族人物在各种碰撞和摩擦中互相伤害的同时,又互相同情、互相教育。在刻薄的言语之下是一个个活生生的家庭,他们互相偎依着,爱着,努力在洛杉矶这个种族众多的城市奋斗着。他们都拥有一个共同语言,那就是爱。
这其中最动人的应该是锁匠Daniel一家:在外被人当作罪犯的Daniel深深爱着自己的女儿,看到5岁的女儿因为害怕而睡不着时,他给女儿编了一个美好的故事:
Daniel: When I was five, this fairy came into my room one night.... And she's flying all around the room knocking down all my posters and stuff.... She reaches into her backpack and pulls out this invisible cloak. She ties it around my neck, and she tells me that it's impenetrable. You know what impenetrable means? It means nothing can go through it, no bullets, nothing. She told me that if I wore it, nothing would hurt me. So I did, and my whole life, I never got shot, stabbed, nothing.... Only she told me that I was supposed to give it to my daughter on her fifth birthday, and I forgot.
说完,Daniel把invisible cloak给女儿Dori“穿”上,然后看着女儿安然入睡,父女之情让人感动。这种人类共同的情感能够超越种族的界限把所有人联系在一起。影片中,伊朗老爸面对一片狼藉说的一声That's all we got. 让华人保险员也暗自神伤;伊朗女儿Dori看到Graham母亲因丧子痛哭,也不禁戚戚然;先前侮辱Cam妻子的警官Ryan后来则冒着生命危险救了她一命;满腹牢骚的Anthony最后放走一车亚裔非法移民;连一直对为自己服务的众多少数族裔态度恶劣的Jean都幡然醒悟,她这样对朋友说:I'm not snapping at you! I am angry, at them, the police, at the dry cleaners who destroyed another blouse today, at the gardener who keeps overwatering the lawn. I just thought that... Carol, I just thought that I would wake up today and I would feel better, you know? But I was still mad and I realized that it had nothing to do with my car being stolen. I wake up like this every morning. I am angry all the time and I don't know why.
后来她不慎摔倒,平时的所谓“好友”对她不管不顾,只有她平时恶言相向的拉美保姆Maria照料她,Jean不禁和她相拥在一起。
Jean: Do you want to hear something funny?
Maria: What, Ms. Jean?
Jean: You're the best friend I've got.
影片高潮处,伊朗老爸怀疑抢劫自己商店的人是拉美锁匠Daniel,他持枪找到Daniel。Daniel的女儿看到爸爸有危险,想到父亲的“魔法斗篷”穿在自己身上,于是冲到Daniel怀里,这时枪声响起,时间似乎静止。画面上出现的是Daniel夫妇悲伤、痛苦的表情,和伊朗老爸一脸的茫然。这时,小女孩在Daniel耳边轻轻说着“Dad, It's OK. I'll protect you,”原来Dori给父亲买的是空心弹,小姑娘安然无恙。伊朗老爸心中的坚冰也由此融化,回到家中他对女儿Dori这样说道:
Iranian father: I shot a little girl.
Dori: What?
Iranian father: No. She's alright. I shot at her, but she's alright. Dori, nothing happened. She is my angel. She comes to protect me, to protect us. You understand?
这部影片反映的虽然是美国社会的问题,但我们的社会何尝不是如此,城乡歧视,地域歧视、口音歧视、职业歧视无处不在。要化解这种歧视和仇恨,也许只有真情和爱才能做到。当这种爱冲破种族的藩篱时,任何东西都阻挡不了它。
影片结尾时,黑人医保顾问和亚裔保险员又发生撞车事件,两人下车理论,互相谩骂。这时镜头拉远,吵架声渐渐远去,抒情的音乐响起,比起影片开始时的撞车事件,我们心里似乎充实了许多,也许歧视、偏见和仇恨永远都不会消失,但只要有爱、有真情,我们就还有希望。
——《新东方英语》杂志2006年5月刊