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Topic: A Fresh Take on a 1934 ‘Murder’

A gruesome murder has been committed on a train in the middle of the night. Only 13 occupants of the carriage could have committed the dastardly deed. Was it a) the Russian princess; b) the American widow; c) the English governess; or d) the Hungarian count? Or any of the nine other multinational posh people and their servants rubbing shoulders on the luxury locomotive, snowbound in the middle of Eastern Europe, with a brilliant Belgian detective inconveniently in their midst?

一宗可怕的謀殺案在夜半的火車上發生。只有13名旅客可能犯下這惡行。是a)俄羅斯公主;b)美國寡婦;c)英國女家教;或d)匈牙利伯爵呢?抑或是其他9位來自各國的紳士淑女和他們的僕人,眾人在受困東歐中部大雪的豪華火車車廂裡摩肩擦踵,這其中還碰巧有個厲害的比利時偵探?

Chances are this sounds familiar. It’s the setup for one of the most famous detective stories in the world: Agatha Christie’s 1934 novel “Murder on the Orient Express,” which has sold millions of copies. It was made into a sumptuous 1974 movie, directed by Sidney Lumet with the starriest of casts (Lauren Bacall, Sean Connery, Ingrid Bergman!). It has been adapted for television, stage and radio. There is a Japanese television version and a computer game.

這聽起來或許耳熟能詳。這是全球最著名偵探小說之一的場景:阿嘉莎.克莉絲蒂1934年的小說「東方快車謀殺案」,銷售數以百萬本計。導演薛尼·盧梅1974年翻拍成豪華版電影,有最耀眼的明星陣容(洛琳·白考兒、史恩·康納萊、英格麗·褒曼!),另並改編成電視劇、舞台劇和廣播劇,且有日本電視劇版本和一款電玩遊戲。

All this meant that Kenneth Branagh, the director and star of the new film version, which opened in the United States on Friday with the starriest of casts (Johnny Depp, Michelle Pfeiffer, Penélope Cruz, Judi Dench!), had his own mystery to solve. How do you reinvent one of the world’s best-loved whodunits for a new era? Branagh’s solution was to modify, and sometimes entirely change, character and plot details in ways that may dismay purists but that he felt would give the piece a more contemporary resonance.

這意味最新版本電影的導演兼主角肯尼斯·布萊納必須拿出一套解開謎團的獨到功夫,新片11月11日在美國上映,仍然有最耀眼的卡司(強尼·戴普、蜜雪兒·菲佛、潘妮洛普·克魯茲、茱蒂·丹契!)你要如何在新的世代詮釋最受世人喜愛的偵探小說呢?布萊納的方法是把角色與劇情細節進行修飾,時而甚至完全予以改變,這麼做或許會令純粹主義者沮喪,他卻覺得更能讓作品引起當代人的共鳴。

“There is always the thorny issue of who will know the plot and how can we divert them,” Branagh said in a telephone interview. “We knew we had to get people’s attention for a recalibrated character in Poirot,” Christie’s idiosyncratic Belgian detective.

布萊納接受電話訪問時說:「總會碰到有些人已經知道劇情,你該如何轉移他們的注意力,讓他們覺得有趣的棘手問題。我們知道,我們必須吸引人們注意經過修改的角色白羅(克莉絲蒂創造的怪異的比利時偵探)。」

To that end, Branagh and the scriptwriter, Michael Green, begin the movie with a showdown at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, as the detective solves another mystery. “I wanted to embrace the exotic and worldly side of Christie, to come into the big, hot open skies and find a new Poirot, our ticket for an exotic adventure,” Branagh said.

為達此目的,布萊納與編劇麥可·格林以偵探在耶路撒冷西牆解開一個對決謎團的方式,揭開電影序幕。布萊納說:「我想擁抱克莉絲蒂奇異與入世的一面,進入那既大又熱的開放天空,找到一個新的白羅,這是我們奇異冒險的門票。」

With an opening that has Poirot tripping up an escaping villain in a positively James Bond-esque manner, Branagh immediately established the detective as a far more dashing man of action than the novel’s small hero “muffled up to the ears of whom nothing was visible but a pink-tipped nose and the two points of an upward curled mustache.”

這個開場讓白羅以絕對詹姆士·龐德的方式逼逃犯露出馬腳,布萊納也立刻將這位偵探塑造成遠比原著中小號英雄瀟灑的行動派男子漢;原著中的小號英雄「衣服直蓋到耳朵,除了一個粉紅鼻子,以及上捲的兩綹髭鬚,什麼都看不見」。Source article: https://paper.udn.com/udnpaper/POH0067/320990/web/

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Topic: The Actor Behind the Ape

The leader of the troops walks slowly through the ranks of soldiers, who part respectfully, as he looks at them with an expression that combines anger, pain and grim intent. But this isn’t a human commander. It’s Caesar, the ape who is the principal figure in 20th Century Fox’s “Planet of the Apes” franchise. The scene comes from the latest in the series, “War for the Planet of the Apes,” which opens in the United States on July 14, and has generated laudatory reviews.

帶領部隊的長官慢慢走進士兵的隊伍中,士兵們尊敬地讓開,他仔細檢視他們,臉上的表情夾雜著憤怒、痛苦和不屈服的決心。但這位長官不是人類的指揮官。牠是「凱撒」,這頭猩猩是20世紀福斯公司「猩球崛起」系列電影的主角。這一幕出自此系列的新片「猩球崛起:終極決戰」,7月14日在美國上映,已經佳評如潮。

In “War,” the fragile truce between humans and apes has given way, and we discover the sinister Colonel (played by Woody Harrelson), whose early actions set in motion a series of devastating events for both populations.

在「終極決戰」片中,人類和猩猩之間脆弱的停火已維持不下去,而我們發現這位陰險的上校(伍迪哈里森飾演),他的初步行動開啟了一連串對人類和猩猩的毀滅事件。

Caesar, the ape whose expressions we are watching via digital transformation as he reacts to the Colonel’s murderous deeds and musters his forces, is played by British actor Andy Serkis. In BoxOfficeMojo.com’s ranking of actors by their ticket sales, Serkis is in the top 30, outflanking Brad Pitt and Daniel Radcliffe, among other far more famous names. His films average $125 million at the box office, more (by some distance) than those of Samuel L. Jackson or Tom Hanks. He has been acting professionally for nearly 30 years and has starred in numerous movies, some of them blockbusters like “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, the 2005 “King Kong,” “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” and the “Apes” reboot.

凱撒,我們正透過數位轉換看著牠的表情的這頭猩猩,牠在對「上校」的凶狠行徑做出反應並召集牠的部隊,牠是由英國演員安迪席克斯飾演。在票房網站BoxOfficeMojo.com的男演員票房排行,安迪席克斯排在前30名,勝過布萊德彼特和丹尼爾雷德克里夫,還有其他名氣大得多的演員。他的電影平均票房1.25億美元,比山繆傑克森、湯姆漢克還多(差距不小)。他從事專業演出近30年,主演過許多電影,其中不乏大賣片,像是「魔戒」三部曲、2005年的「金剛」、「星際大戰7:原力覺醒」和「猩球崛起」的重拍電影。

Yet, for most moviegoers, Serkis, 53, is probably neither a household name nor face, since he has specialized for more than a decade in creating roles through performance capture — a complex technology that records the movement and facial expressions of human actors and then painstakingly renders them digitally to create fantastical characters, like Caesar, Gollum and King Kong.

然而,對大多數電影觀眾來說,53歲的席克斯大概不是家喻互曉的名字或臉孔,因為他十多年來專精於透過動態捕捉科技創造角色─這是一種複雜的科技,記錄人類演員的動作和表情,再費力地數位化,創造出想像的角色,像是凱撒、咕嚕和金剛。

Caesar, wrote A.O. Scott of The New York Times in a review of “Dawn of the Planet of the Apes,” is “a role that continues to redefine screen acting in the digital age. His facial expressions and body language are so evocatively and precisely rendered that it is impossible to say where his art ends and the exquisite artifice of Weta Digital, the special-effects company, begins.”

紐時影評人A.O.史考特在「猩球崛起:黎明的進擊」的評論寫道,凱撒是「數位時代繼續重新定義大銀幕表演的角色。他的臉部表情和身體語言如此生動和精準演出,不可能說他的演藝止於何處,特效公司Weta數位公司的精良技術又自何處開始。」Source article: https://paper.udn.com/udnpaper/POH0067/315730/web/#top

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Topic: Berlin Film Festival to make acting prizes gender neutral

The organizers of the Berlin International Film Festival (aka Berlinale) said last Monday that they will stop awarding separate acting prizes to women and men beginning next year, and the performance awards will be defined in a gender-neutral way at next year’s festival, for which a physical event is planned.

柏林國際影展主辦單位上週一表示,自明年起,他們不再分別頒發男女演員獎項。明年的影展將會以性別中立的方式來定義表演獎項,並將舉行實體典禮。

The festival awards a Golden Bear for the best film and a series of Silver Bears, which until this year included best actor and best actress honors. Organizers said those prizes will be replaced with a Silver Bear for Best Leading Performance and a Silver Bear for Best Supporting Performance.

柏林影展頒發金熊獎給最佳影片,以及銀熊獎給一系列項目,截至今年,銀熊獎均包括最佳男主角及最佳女主角獎。主辦單位表示,這些獎項將以最佳主角銀熊獎,及最佳配角銀熊獎兩獎項取代。

In a statement, the co-heads of the festival, Mariette Rissenbeek and Carlo Chatrian, said “not separating the awards in the acting field according to gender comprises a signal for a more gender-sensitive awareness in the film industry.”

柏林影展兩位總監瑪麗耶特‧里森貝克及卡洛‧夏堤安在一份聲明中表示:「不以性別來區分表演類獎項,所包含的信號是電影界對性別有更加敏銳的意識」。

The festival’s Golden Bear is one of the most prestigious awards in Europe, together with the Palme d’Or of the Cannes festival in France and the Golden Lion award of the Venice Film Festival. Cannes still singles out a best actor and actress, while Venice awards a Volpi cup to actors of each sex.

德國柏林影展的金熊獎為歐洲地位最高的電影獎之一,與法國坎城影展的金棕櫚獎,以及義大利威尼斯電影節的金獅獎齊名。坎城影展及威尼斯影展仍分別頒發男、女演員獎。

At the same time, the Alfred Bauer Prize, which is named after the festival’s founding director, will be permanently retired. The prize was suspended this year due to revelations about Bauer’s role in the Nazis’ moviemaking bureaucracy.

此外,以柏林影展創辦人命名的阿爾弗雷德‧鮑爾獎將永不再頒發。鮑爾被踢爆曾為納粹政府電影機構工作,因此今年該獎停頒。

Commenting on the decision to hold a physical event next year, despite uncertainties due to the coronavirus pandemic, the two directors stressed the need for a “lively relationship with the audience.” “In times of the corona pandemic, it has become even clearer that we still require analogue experience spaces in the cultural realm,” they said, noting that other festivals have also resumed holding physical rather than virtual events. The 2021 festival is scheduled for Feb. 11-21.

縱有冠狀病毒疫情所造成之不確定性,對於明年柏林影展舉行實體典禮的決定,兩位總監強調「與觀眾保持活生生關係」之必要性。「冠狀病毒疫情中愈發清楚顯示,在文化場域中,我們仍需要能提供類比經驗的空間」,他們表示,其他影展也已恢復舉行實體典禮。二○二一年之柏林影展訂於二月十一日至二十一日舉行。Source article: https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/lang/archives/2020/08/31/2003742547