【译】《电影评论》肯尼思·洛纳根访谈

【本文首发于《虹膜》公众号】

Interview: Kenneth Lonergan

ByDaniel EaganonNovember 11, 2016

作者：Daniel Eagan

译者：覃天

校对：易二三

来源：Film Comment（2016年11月11日）

https://www.filmcomment.com/blog/interview-kenneth-lonergan-manchester-by-the-sea/

After festival screenings at Sundance and in Telluride, Toronto, New York, and London,Manchester by the Seareaches select theaters on November 18 wrapped in praise. Written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan, the drama focuses on Lee Chandler (Casey Affleck), a handyman suddenly named guardian of his orphaned nephew Patrick (played by Ben O’Brien as a young boy and Lucas Hedges as a teenager).

《海边的曼彻斯特》由肯尼斯·洛纳根编剧并执导，讲述了李·钱德勒（卡西·阿弗莱克饰）的故事，他是一名修理工，一场变故让他变成了为侄子帕特里克唯一的监护人（本·奥布莱恩饰演小时候的帕特里克，卢卡斯·赫奇斯饰演青年帕特里克）。

Set mostly in a blue-collar seaside community in Massachusetts,Manchesterby the Seaexplores the wary relationship between an underachiever trying to piece his life back together and a typically self-absorbed teenager already familiar with loss. Dragged back to a home he abandoned, Lee is forced to deal with the banality of death—morgues, personal effects, wills, upkeep on a house and boat—while confronting a past he has tried to avoid. Patrick approaches grief by focusing on sports, his rock band, and girls.

《海边的曼彻斯特》的故事主要发生在马萨诸塞州的一个海滨小镇上，影片探索了一个试图将自己破碎的人生拼凑起来的人与一个自我陶醉的青少年之间的谨慎关系。李无力地回到了他不愿再回到的家，他被迫面对死亡的平凡——停尸房，个人物品，遗嘱，房屋和船只的维护——还有他力图避免的过去。帕特里克则通过专注于运动、他的摇滚乐队和女孩来处理悲伤。

Manchester by the Seahas been mentioned so frequently as an awards contender that it risks being overwhelmed by hype. But no matter what you read about it, the movie will still surprise you, in part because of Lonergan’s uncanny knack for finding the inner truth of his characters. His humor and insight are a striking corrective to the cookie-cutter creations and contrived storylines found in many films.

最近一段时间，《海边的曼彻斯特》常常成为各类电影奖项的有力竞争者，以至于这部电影本身可能都会被大肆宣传而淹没。但无论你读到关于它的什么信息，这部电影仍然会让你大吃一惊，部分原因是肯尼思·洛纳根找到了呈现人物内心真相的不可思议的诀窍。正是他的幽默和洞察力，让《海边的曼彻斯特》不同于许多电影千篇一律的创作以及做作的故事情节。

Fighting a cold and admittedly worn-out from talking for months about the project, Lonergan spoke by phone about this and his two previous movies,You Can Count on Me(2000) andMargaret(2011).

几个月来，洛纳根一直在和不同的人谈到这部电影，他需要和11月寒冷的天气以及自己的疲倦感作斗争。他在电话里和我们谈论了《海边的曼彻斯特》以及他之前的两部作品：《我办事你放心》（2000）和《玛格丽特》（2011）。

Let’s talk about the scene in which Lee and his estranged wife Randi [Michelle Williams] reconnect on a sidewalk. It’s one of the key moments in the story.

记者：让我们来谈谈李和很久不见的前妻兰迪（米歇尔·威廉姆斯饰）在街上相遇的那个场景吧，这是这部电影的关键时刻之一。

Yeah, it’s the pivotal scene. It’s the first time they really talk about anything since they split up years ago, and it’s the end of his somewhat halting attempts to possibly work himself back into the life there, and it’s the beginning of the end of his attempt to explore the idea of being his nephew’s guardian.

肯尼思·洛纳根：是的，这是很关键的一场戏。这是他们在几年前分手以后，第一次真正谈论一些事情，这一幕意味着，李结束了试图让自己重新回到那里生活的尝试，也是从此刻开始，他不再试图成为侄子的监护人。

It’s a really important scene. The worry for me was that I was aware it was important, that without that scene working as best it possibly could we wouldn’t have as good of a movie. It’s a very emotional scene, very sad. But it’s also very loving.

这是一个非常重要的场景。让我担心的是，我意识到它很重要，如果这个场景没有尽可能好地发挥出它的作用，我们就不会有如今这样一部好电影。这是一个十分感人，同时非常悲伤的场景，而它依然带有爱意。

We knew we wanted to give it a full half-day, so we had to reschedule it a couple of times. It came near the end of the shoot, which really worked out nicely for all of us. Because I think by that time Casey and Michelle had both been inhabiting the characters for a while and were comfortable with them.

我和摄制组的成员都知道，我们想用整整半天的时间来拍这个场景，所以我们不得不安排了好几次。这场戏的拍摄也意味着，整部影片的拍摄进入了尾声，这对我们所有人来说都是很好的结果。因为我认为，那时卡西·阿弗莱克和米歇尔·威廉姆斯都已经在角色中生活了一段时间，并且和各自的角色相处得很舒服。

We talked through it as we did with all the scenes, while we were there as well as the night before. So it was pretty easy to do in terms of getting it done. They were both very emotionally available and ready to go. We had two cameras that day, so we just shot it.

You make it sound easy, but it must have been hard for them to sustain those emotions take after take.

我们用对待所有场景的方式一样，在拍摄的前一晚谈论了这场戏的拍摄方式。因此，就完成这件事的难易度而言，是相当容易的。卡西和米歇尔都酝酿好了情绪，随时准备各自离开。那天我们有两台摄影机，所以我们就拍下来了。也许这听起来很容易，但对他们来说，一次次地维持心中的情绪一定很难。

It’s a lot easier for me than for them, that’s for sure. I don’t know how they do it, truthfully. I don’t mean to make it sound easy because I think what they have to do is enormously difficult. I have to understand what’s happening in the scene and hope that my thoughts about it will be helpful for them. But they have to live through that and be those people and have those feelings for real even though the circumstances are pretend. But because the two of them are so exceptionally not just talented but professional and skillful, I wasn’t really worried that it wasn’t going to turn out well. I just really wanted it to.

这对我来说要比他们容易得多，这一点是肯定的。老实说，我不知道他们是怎么做到的。我并不是想让它听起来很容易，因为我认为他们要面对的事情是非常困难的，而我必须了解现场正在发生的事情，并希望我的想法能对他们有所帮助。但他们必须经历完整的故事，成为那些角色，并拥有真实的感觉，即使场景是假的。但由于他们两人不仅才华横溢，而且非常专业和娴熟，所以我并不会真的担心结果会不好。我只是单纯希望那场戏达到剧本里写的程度。

How did you and Casey Affleck reach a consensus about Lee?

记者：你和卡西·阿弗莱克是如何就李·钱德勒这一角色达成共识的？

I think we had very similar opinions because we went through everything together. We had a really interesting time working everything out. It was somewhat of a unique experience for me and I think for him. He has a million questions, he’s like a relentless detective and wants to know everything he possibly could so that he has a foundation from which to perform a scene. You know he’s bringing everything he has to it by being the guy, and I’m bringing everything I can think of to help him from when I was pretending to be the guy when I was writing it. So I think I have at least one version of the character that is useful for the actor to hear about. But at some point I step back and he has to become the person. And at that point, there’s a whole gang of other things that are Casey’s and Casey’s alone that come into play.

肯尼思·洛纳根：我认为我们有非常相似的观点，因为我们一起经历了整个拍摄过程。我们度过了一段非常有趣的时间，把一切都解决了。在某种程度上来说，这对我和他都是一次独特的经历。他就像一个坚持不懈的侦探，有一百万个想要问我的问题，想要知道他能知道的一切——这样，他就拥有了进入一场戏的表演基础。他把他所拥有的一切都变成了那个男人，而我把我在写这部小说，当我假装成李·钱德勒时所能想到的一切都带给了卡西，希望能帮到他。所以我想，至少我心里有一个对李的理解对演员来说是有用的。但在某种程度上，我也会和卡西保持距离，因为他必须成为李。在这一点上，卡西和他的孤独感对其他许多事情都产生了影响。

Did Affleck change the character in ways you didn’t expect?

记者：卡西·阿弗莱克是否用你没有预料到的方式改变了你笔下的李？

Well all actors do, because they’re all different. They’re never what you imagine because what you imagine is imaginary. I mean if I imagined Casey playing that part… you don’t want that, you want the actors to come in and do things you didn’t expect and say things that you didn’t know.

肯尼斯·洛纳根：《海边的曼彻斯特》里其他的演员都是这样，因为他们每个人都是不同的。他们从来不是我脑中想象的形象，因为写剧本时，我是根据想象写出了这些人物。我是说如果我想象卡西·阿弗莱克扮演某个具体的角色时，而你却不想处理这样的角色，你想让演员成为那个角色，做一些在你预料之外的事，说出一些你不知道的事情。

It’s great when their boundaries and your boundaries of what fits within the story and the circumstances overlap. And it’s really great when you see someone inhabiting that role so fully and still retain all the points that are important to me as well. It’s one thing to write a story, it’s another to act it. That’s why it’s so much fun to work with great actors. They literally bring it to life.

当这些演员的表演边界和你的边界同时符合故事和情景的时候，这是很棒的。我也很乐于看到他们如此充盈地扮演着角色，同时仍然保留着对我来说很重要的所有要点。写故事是一回事，演故事又是另一回事。这就是为什么和伟大的演员合作总是如此有趣。他们真的把表演融入了生活中。

Does Lee expect to be punished for the tragic event that occurs in the story?

记者：你认为在电影中，李希望自己为发生的悲剧而受到惩罚吗？

I think so, yes.

肯尼思·洛纳根：嗯，我认为是这样的。

That happens with characters in your other works as well.

记者：你其他作品中的人物身上也会出现这种情况。

I hadn’t noticed that, but I see what you’re getting at. When Sam inYou Can Count on Measks a minister if she should be punished for having an affair with a married man, she literally says, “Don’t you think it would be better if you told me I was going to burn in hell?” And he says no.

肯尼思·洛纳根：我自己都没有注意到这一点，但我明白你的意思。当《我办事你放心》中的萨米问一位部长，她是否应该因为与已婚男子有染而受到惩罚时，她直截了当地问道：「你不觉得你告诉我，我应该在地狱里被烧死会更好吗？」对方说不是。

It’s absolutely true that Lisa inMargaretis looking for someone to punish her for what she did. But she’s also looking for some justice for what happened on the bus, for the bus driver. And I think that Casey’s character, Lee, feels responsible in the police station, at least expecting to be put in jail. He definitely blames himself for what happened.

毫无疑问，《玛格丽特》中的丽莎也在寻找一个人来惩罚她的所作所为。但她也在为公交车上发生的事情寻求一些正义，为公交车司机伸张正义。我认为卡西·阿弗莱克饰演的李在警察局面对询问时，不止一次地感到自己对过失负有责任，至少希望被关进监狱。毋庸置疑，他肯定会为已经发生的事自责。

Is it significant that you identify Lee and Patrick as Catholics?

记者：你将李和帕特里克都设置为天主教徒是有某种含义的吗？

Well, they’re Catholics because that’s what they would be if they lived there. But, I don’t know, if guilt’s a theme, it’s a psychological one, not a religious one. It’s not one that I’m super consciously aware of. I’m not religious at all. I mean I’m interested in religion as a human phenomenon, but I don’t personally ascribe to it. So it’s unlikely that there’s a big element of that behind the film.

肯尼思·洛纳根：如果他们住在海边的曼彻斯特，他们自然就是天主教徒。但是，我不知道，如果负罪感是一个主题的话，那么应该说它是一个心理主题，而不是宗教主题。我没有强烈地意识到这一点。我完全不是一个宗教主义者。我的意思是，我对宗教这一人类社会中的现象很感兴趣，但我个人却不会从宗教中寻找答案。因此，这部电影的背后不太可能有过多的宗教因素。

Do you feel guilt drivesManchester by the Sea?

记者：你认为负罪感是《海边的曼彻斯特》的叙事动力吗？

It’s not the prime factor. Lee’s also lost his children and his wife. It’s not just that he did something that he feels guilty about, it’s that he has this lossandit’s his fault. You could have a very similar story with someone who wasnotresponsible.

肯尼思·洛纳根：这不是主要因素。李也失去了他的孩子和妻子。这不仅仅是因为他做了一些让他感到非常内疚的事情，而是他遭受了巨大的损失，并将罪责都拦在自己身上。对一个普通观众来说，他也许会和一个李这样不太负责的人有着非常相似的故事。

I wouldn’t necessarily assert that guilt inYou Can Count on Mewas a primary factor either. I think Sam was feeling a little guilty about this and that, but everyone feels guilty about something. I think the main idea of that story is that she’s caught in a quandary of trying to save her brother and protect her son at the same time.

我也不一定会断言，在《我办事你放心》中，负罪感也是一个主要因素。我想萨米对许多事都会感到有点内疚，但每个人都对某些事情感到内疚。我认为这个故事的主旨是她陷入了一个两难的境地——她既要救她的弟弟，又要保护她的儿子。

And if you asked me whatMargaretis about, guilt would not be anywhere near the top 10 things. Certainly it’s a driving psychological factor, but I wouldn’t say that’s what it’s about. I think it’s about the size of the world and how many different points of view there are. How lost one person’s voice and wishes and feelings can get in such a symphony of voices, thoughts, and feelings, and other people just trying to live their lives.

而负罪感也不会是《玛格丽特》叙事的主导因素。它可能是一个推动心理因素，但不会是原因。我认为这有关世界的大小以及众多看待事情的不同的眼光，有关一个人的声音、愿望和感情怎么会消失在这样一个由同样因素织成的交响乐中，而其他人只是在努力过自己的生活。

Now, these stories may all be about my guilt about something, but that’s not what I’mtryingto write about.Manchester by the Seais a little bit more directly about that, certainly. But I could also say it’s just as equally about grief and loyalty and coping and love.

现在，这些电影中的故事可能都与我对某些事情的负罪感有关，但这并不是我想要写的。当然，《海边的曼彻斯特》更直接地讲述了这一点。但我也可以说，它同样是一部关于悲伤、忠诚、接纳和爱的影片。

But I definitely tend to write about people who feel guilty. I’ve written a lot of things that tend to circle around the idea of survivor guilt. But that’s completely accidental or completely psychologically driven. You don’t always know what’s behind what you’re writing about, and what’s behind it isn’t always the most interesting thing in it. But those elements are certainly there and common to my work.

但我总是倾向于写那些感到内心充满了负罪感的人。我写的很多作品中，那些人物都是与死亡抗争后苟且偷生，总是认为自己有罪的人。但这完全是偶然的，或者完全是我自己的心思驱动的。我不会下意识地想到，自己正在写的东西背后是什么，而且它背后的东西并不总是其中最有趣的事情。但这些元素肯定存在于我的作品中。

For all I know, the psychological wellspring of what makes you write something is not always the same as the content. I think the content’s hopefully just as interesting. I think the psychology has to be consistent with the content, otherwise the piece will have a false ring to it. That’s why I don’t discount the presence and the weight of the guilty feelings the characters have or whatever guilt I may have in describing the films, because it’s obviously a big part of it. But I think it’s one part and I don’t even think it’s the most interesting part.

我认为，促使写作的心理源泉并不总是和写作的内容保持一致。我当然希望内容也一样有趣，但我认为心里的想法必须与内容保持一致，否则写出来的东西就会给人一种虚假的感觉。这就是为什么我不会忽视角色身上的负罪感，以及电影中任何负罪感的存在和分量，因为这显然是作品中很大的一部分。但我认为它只是一部分，甚至不认为它是最有趣的部分。

What I’m really interested in is people struggling with situations that are bigger than they are, that are overwhelming to them. Also the disparity of experience, the variety of human experience, how one person can have one kind of life and his neighbor will have a completely different kind in every respect. That never ceases to fascinate and confound me and also impress me.

我真正感兴趣的是，人们正在与比他们本身更大的境遇作斗争，这些境遇对他们来说是压倒性的。还有经验的差异，人类经验的多样性，比如，为什么一个人只能过着一种生活，而他的邻居则在各个方面都过着截然不同的生活？我从未停止过这种思考，它让我既着迷又困惑，给我留下了深刻的印象。

Is there any solution to grief?

记者：对于悲痛，你认为有任何解决办法吗？

I don’t think there is, except for time and finding other emotional content in your life as you get older and grow and more time passes between your loss and the present.

肯尼思·洛纳根：我认为没有，也许时间是愈伤的良药，或者在你的生活中寻找一些其他的情感。随着你变老和成长，在你拥有的和失去的东西之间，有越来越多的时间会流逝。

You’ve used opera, with its outsized emotions, in your work, and inManchester by the Seapieces like the “Pastoral Symphony” from Handel’sMessiah. Can you talk about how music functions in your work?

记者：在你的电影中，你曾使用过歌剧，它有着超乎寻常的情感。在《海边的曼彻斯特》中，你也使用了像亨德尔的《弥赛亚》中《田园交响曲》这样的作品。你能谈谈音乐在你的工作中是如何发挥作用的吗？

There’s no opera in this film, but there’s plenty of opera in the extended edition ofMargaret, which is the one that counts. For that film particularly, I think the outsized emotions have some correlation with the teenage experience of life, which is a bit outsized.

肯尼思·洛纳根：《海边的曼彻斯特》里没有使用歌剧，但加长版的《玛格丽特》中则有很多歌剧，这才是最重要的，尤其是那部电影，我觉得歌剧中的情感可以反衬出青春期的生活经历。

Also, lifedoesmean that much to people who are living it. When your boyfriend leaves you or your husband leaves you or you die of tuberculosis, it is an opera-sized tragedy. At the same time, it’s a fairly accurate reflection of the human experience. While also being a bit silly.

此外，生活本身对生活在其中的人来说并不意味着什么。当你的男朋友离开你，或者你的丈夫离开你，或者你死于肺结核，这是一场歌剧般的悲剧。同时，它也相当准确地反映了人们自身的经验，同时也不可避免地有点可笑。

There’s also a sort of opera theme running through a play I wrote calledThe Starry Messenger, which touches on the same idea that it’s not wrong to think of your life as a bigger story than it otherwise sometimes feels.

歌剧的音乐主题同样还贯穿于我写的一部名为《星际信使》（The Starry Messenger）的戏剧中，它触及了同样的理念，即把你自己的生活想象成一个更大的故事，这是没有错的。

InManchester by the Seathere’s music from theMessiah, a sonata for oboe and piano, some choral music by Massenet. As well as Lesley Barber’s score. The music pieces are not so much about the human element in the story, but just about the presence of beauty in the world that continues on above us and around us no matter what’s going on. Sometimes in a way that feels indifferent, and sometimes in a way that feels very sustaining and warming.

《海边的曼彻斯特》的音乐有亨德尔的《弥赛亚》中双簧管和钢琴的奏鸣曲，还有儒勒·马斯内的一些合唱音乐，以及莱斯利·巴伯的配乐。这些音乐作品并不是关于故事中人的因素，而是关于无论发生什么，永恒的美丽将一直萦绕在我们的上方以及周围持续存在的世界里。有时，它以一种冷漠的方式出现，有时则会以一种让你感到非常恒久和温暖的方式存在着。

Was this a difficult shoot overall?

记者：总的来说，《海边的曼彻斯特》的拍摄过程艰难吗？

Just the usual pressure. Any film shoot is pressurized because there’s a lot to do in a limited amount of time and with a limited amount of money. We were under-scheduled from the beginning—it probably would have been better if we’d gotten that all figured out before we started. It became a sort of day-by-day process, but it ended up working out all right. We ended up extending I think four days. It’s not like we were doing a million setups per scene. We were doing one or two, we’re not very extravagant.

肯尼思·洛纳根：压力还好吧。任何电影的拍摄都是有压力的，因为在时间和资金的限制下，还有很多事情要做。我们从一开始就计划不足——如果我们在出发之前把这一切都弄清楚，情况可能会更好。这变成了一种日复一日的过程，但最终一切都很顺利。拍摄周期最终延长了四天。我们又不会每个场景都会花费上百万的布景。整个拍摄过程中，我们只这样做了一两次，我们不是很奢侈。

What the pressure does is make you concentrate despite the swarm of activity and despite whatever the problems of the day happen to be. It’s very difficult. Fortunately the creative problems of the day are front and center, so they draw your attention away from all the other stuff. And then you go home and worry, oh my God, we don’t have enough time, we’ll never make it, etc.

压力的作用在于让你集中精力，不管一天中发生了什么问题，不管每天的拍摄有多繁忙，这是非常困难的。幸运的是，每天拍摄时有关创造性的问题是最先出现，也是最为显著的，所以它们会把你的注意力从所有其他事情上转移开。然后当我回到住处，才会开始感叹，「哦，我的上帝，我们没有足够的时间，我们永远也赶不上拍摄进度了。」等等。

At this stage I tend to see all the things that I don’t like, that I wish I could have done a little better. But we worked very hard and I’m very happy with it.

在这个阶段，我倾向于看到所有我不喜欢的事情，那些我希望我能做得更好的事情。但我们非常努力地在工作，我就很欣慰了。