《大师》:已驯服和未驯服的“野兽”

这篇影评可能有剧透
《大师》这部电影的灵感来源是Hubbard在 1950年左右发展宣传科学教(或者其前身Dianetics?)的这段历史,看完之后很自然的问题是,如果Philip Seymour Hoffman饰演的角色“大师”Dodd是对应于Hubbard的话,那Freddie是从哪来的?为什么他在片中有这么重要的地位?我比较相信的一种理论是Hubbard = Freddie + Dodd,是他的两个侧面。
首先是Hubbard在当时的真实经历,参考wiki可以发现Hubbard本人参加了二战,且服役于海军(Hubbard was commissioned as a Lieutenant (junior grade) in the U.S. Naval Reserve on July 19, 1941),同时他在战争中自称受到严重伤害,并且在治愈自己过程中发展出了自己的教义(He was "severely wounded and was taken crippled and blinded" to a military hospital, where he "worked his way back to fitness, strength and full perception in less than two years, using only what he knew and could determine about Man and his relationship to the universe." 还有 "Hubbard's war service has great significance in the history and mythology of the Church of Scientology, as he is said to have cured himself through techniques that would later underpin Scientology and Dianetics."),而且在战后家庭破裂,自称被家人朋友抛弃(he "was abandoned by family and friends as a supposedly hopeless cripple and a probable burden upon them for the rest of my days."),面对着严重生活危机。在片中可以发现,这些个人经历大部分被归在了Freddie而非Dodd身上。
于是在电影中,从Hubbard分离出了Freddie和Dodd,把Hubbard的自我治疗转换成了Dodd对Freddie的治疗。这样做我觉得可以在这两个角色间形成相互参照的关系,在1950年左右美国的时代气氛中表现了两种人生选择间的冲突。
用导演Paul Thomas Anderson(PTA)自己的话来说,这个时代是“Starting with a kind of victory, but at what cost? Obviously a lot of lives, a lot of damage and a lot of sadness. A lot of death, a lot of question marks around for people. So, you have this kind of push of optimism but this cloud of tragedy over everything. I don't know, when I was growing up I saw World War II films and everything was very heroic, you got this sense growing up where I come from, in America, this sense that we won something. We did something great, how could anybody be sad about that? Obviously it was quite different as I grew up and I got older, I realized that's not how it was.”
开始是二战胜利,可代价是很多的人命、损失和悲伤,一方面乐观主义的精神在推动社会,可同时好像所有事都笼罩在一种悲剧的气氛中,在这个时代背景下,产生了各种疑问,给了科学教之类产生的土壤。
此外PTA还提到过,像Freddie 那样的人在战争中习惯了有序、服从长官(某种意义上的master)命令的生活,战争之后,他突然失去了指引,不知所措,只好在社会中盲打瞎撞,处处受阻。在片中,Dodd的生活是很光鲜,但我觉得可以想象他经历了和Freddie一样的问题,只是和Hubbard一样,尽力克服了这种困难并融入了社会,虽然他仍然被不断攻击质疑,不得安宁。
这有点接近Philip Seymour Hoffman对他饰演的Dodd的解读(PTA说比他自己总结的还好,也可能是客套~):“They're coming from different places but they're more the same, they're both wild beasts I think. One of them has just tamed it somehow and he's trying to teach other people how to do that. But ultimately that's where the doubt comes in, where the whole reluctant prophet thing comes in. Ultimately, he wants to be wild like Freddie is, so there's this real attraction there over those two very things: wanting to be tame it and wanting to be wild. I think that's basically what life is. I think that's what we'd wake up every morning going, '****, why can't I just run naked through the streets of Venice and just eat and shit. Why can't I just do that and have it be okay? Is it possible that I can just have sex with everyone I see today? No I can't. But I wish that was possible. So I think I'm just going to go find my Master, he'll teach me how not to do that. ”
Dodd和Freddie虽说出身不同,但都是“野兽”,其中Dodd学会了怎么抑制自己的欲望,然后就去教别人,虽然从根本上说他还是想像Freddie那样。所以在Hoffman看来,这片反映了被社会制度驯服和自由意志的永恒对立。大师会去指导一个人如何克制自己的欲望,成为社会能接纳的“正常人”。
而且电影中确实也验证了Hoffman的说法,表现出Dodd和Freddie一样,性格中也有很强的非理性、癫狂、“兽性”的元素(他能从Freddie那得到写作灵感的原因可能就在于此)。Dodd面对别人质疑时非常容易暴怒,他的理论则接近巫术,电影里有一位质疑者更直接指出他是非理性的。此外最明显的就是舞会那段,他简直发狂了。
对于这一段,PTA的点评不错: “What I like most about that night was I thought here is a person who can seemingly drink anybody under the table – drink anything and still be standing – and here he is crumpled into the corner. This is somebody who has absolutely met his match – at a point that hes sinking and passed out – this guy’s just getting started. That’s my favorite part about that. It’s not the women and all that – it’s he’s still going and he can out-party Freddie. ”
简单来说就是Freddie都已经醉到不行了,结果Dodd仍然意犹未尽,他压抑的激情比Freddie还要强烈。
两人的共同爱好也同样说明了他们性格的这种共通之处。Freddie擅长酿酒,Dodd也是最能享受他这种创造的人。这容易就让人联想到所谓的“酒神精神”,激情和非理性的代表。 两个人也都喜欢呆在海上,而海水也是非理性、潜意识的象征,就像福柯所指出的:“水域和疯癫长期以来就在欧洲人的梦幻中相互联系着。” “疯癫是人身上晦暗的水质的表征。水质是一种晦暗的无序状态、一种流动的混沌,是一切事物的发端和归宿,是与明快和成熟稳定的精神相对立的。” Dodd的那艘游艇,是否就是现代版的愚人船呢?
尽管如此,两人最终还是选择了相反的人生方向。虽然Dodd仍然被崇尚科学理性的主流社会质疑和排斥,烦恼不断,但他已经习惯于去适应社会(或者说被社会控制?),离不开了。舞会之后,Amy Adams演的他的妻子(社会束缚的代表?)替他手淫发泄,这里应该是在和开头Freddie在沙滩手淫作对比,指出两人的不同。摩托车那段可能也可以体现这点,Dodd虽然可以暂时疯狂,但还要回到原点:家庭(女儿和女婿)和社会规范去,而Freddie仍可以自由离开。
相反的,Freddie则选择孤独,活在自己的世界中,放纵自己被本能激情控制。他做出这种选择的原因可以参考PTA对他的点评:
“I guess he is somebody who will probably move the rest of his life alone and sort of learn to survive alone. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t completely hunger or desire to be around people or to be part of something. But the second he feels too much good will in the room is probably the moment he’s going to slip. That much love and attention is probably worth bailing on for somebody like him. ”
也就是说他不是完全不想融入人群,可是一旦他发现别人对他有了很深的感情,对他关怀太多, 他就想要逃离,因为这种个性,他恐怕难逃孤独一生的命运。
Freddie的这种个性虽然可以理解成一种追求自由独立的天性,但从电影中的证据来看更可能是家庭生活创伤的结果。他的父亲死于酗酒,母亲关在精神病院,特别是母亲的情况,他在第一次被Dodd“治疗”时最痛苦的就是这一点。可以想象在这样的家庭长大应该是很不快乐的,而电影开始时他和医生提到的梦就是他和父母一块喝酒的“合家欢”场景,体现了他这方面的遗憾。值得一提的是在讲述完这个梦后电影马上溶接到Freddie拍摄的那些看起来十分美好的50年代美国标准生活照,这样做一方面讽刺了这种理想生活的虚假性,反映了前面引用的PTA对那个时代的理解,一方面似乎也暗示了这种生活对Freddie来说和他的梦一样,他永远只能“在画面外”,没办法真正进入其中。 Dodd对他来说也是类似父亲的替代(那位Freddie特别提及像他父亲的工友被毒死的酒,Dodd喝起来却很享受,可能也说明Dodd相比下是个更强大的“父亲”)。
但Freddie最终还是对家庭生活没有信心,无论是Dodd和他的宗教团体这种家庭的替代品,还是Doris(Doris当时都已经答应他不去挪威了,他还是选择先离开一段时间,结果一去七年)。我想第二次治疗时Dodd的女婿就戳到了他心里的痛处:可能是因为他觉得自己和母亲一样,都属于精神病院这种被主流社会排斥的世界,他害怕会和Doris重蹈父母的命运。他离开Dodd,可能也有这方面的原因(在和Dodd最后一次会面时,Freddie愿意做帮他拍照的工作,只想和Dodd维持这种较疏远、短期的联系,但Dodd的妻子不允许:“我们不要拍照的,弗雷迪.你要不就永远做下去,要不就不要做”。)。
这样看来,片名里的master是指什么呢?按前面提到的Hoffman的解读,可以说最根本的master是社会制度,但我想这片说得更宽泛,比如人与人之间也有“主”与“奴”的关系,Amy Adams和Dodd之间(按PTA的说法,在那场手淫戏里,她是Dodd的master),Dodd和Freddie之间。
而Freddie在结尾时真的是摆脱了master的自由状态吗?应该也不是,因为他的生活被自己的情绪、封闭性格和创伤所奴役了,虽然在一定程度上逃离了社会的束缚,但却被困在自设的心理牢笼中。他面容憔悴,酗酒,肾有毛病,而且就像PTA说的,他不是不想融入社会,只是他做不到而已,也就是说他丧失了自己的健康,且失去了选择融入社会的自由。福柯在《疯癫与文明》里的这段话好像就可以形容他:
“水域和航行确实扮演了这种角色。狂人被困在船上,无处逃遁。他被送到干支百叉的江河上或茫茫无际的大海上,也就被送交给脱离尘世的、不可捉摸的命运;他成了最自由、最开放的地方的囚徒:被牢牢束缚在有无数去向的路口。他是最卓越的旅客,也就是说被囚禁在旅行状态之中。他将去的地方是未知的,正如他一旦下了船,他来自何方也是未知的。只有在两个都不属于他的世界之间的不毛之地里,才有他的真理和他的故乡。”
于是,两个人都处在受困的状态中,同病相怜。Dodd在和Freddie最后一次会面时说希望他能找出一种没有master的生活方式,并说还没人曾做到这一点,这说明他不认为自己做到了,也不认为Freddie原来那种生活是。因此,我觉得这片最终还是关于人如何才能达到真正“自由”、快乐的状态,一个无解的难题。
另外关于宗教信仰的问题,PTA的回答很有趣:
“Q: The Master appears like the continuation of There Will Be Blood: as if with every film you were telling a new chapter of the history of American and its relation with religious faith.
PTA: Oddly, I'm not fascinated by the theme of faith. What means something for me, it's the faith in someone. In There Will Be Blood, people had faith in Eli, they believed in him. The audience which assisted at Tom Cruise's conference in Magnolia drank his words. And Freddie has faith in Dodd.”
这么说来,包括《血色将至》、《木兰花》等前作,一直以来吸引PTA的不是信仰问题,而是人之间的信任关系,在这片里就是Freddie对Dodd这个人的信任。而且我想Freddie 始终没有真正相信 Dodd的理论。有个细节似乎可以说明这一点:片中特别点出的Dodd的一条具体教义是人的灵魂存在在整个时间中,存在在很多躯体里,并且他能让人回忆起前世的生命和创伤,这也是他治疗理论的关键。可是在电影里他能让Freddie回忆起的只有关于Doris、母亲等等的今生的经历,而前世的经历,都只有Dodd片尾处直接告诉Freddie的那些。这样在两个人交流中就排除了Dodd理论比较“玄”的那部分,基本只是一个人设法帮助另一个人走出心灵困境而已(无论真实动机如何)。这片感兴趣的,还是这种人之间的关系。
首先是Hubbard在当时的真实经历,参考wiki可以发现Hubbard本人参加了二战,且服役于海军(Hubbard was commissioned as a Lieutenant (junior grade) in the U.S. Naval Reserve on July 19, 1941),同时他在战争中自称受到严重伤害,并且在治愈自己过程中发展出了自己的教义(He was "severely wounded and was taken crippled and blinded" to a military hospital, where he "worked his way back to fitness, strength and full perception in less than two years, using only what he knew and could determine about Man and his relationship to the universe." 还有 "Hubbard's war service has great significance in the history and mythology of the Church of Scientology, as he is said to have cured himself through techniques that would later underpin Scientology and Dianetics."),而且在战后家庭破裂,自称被家人朋友抛弃(he "was abandoned by family and friends as a supposedly hopeless cripple and a probable burden upon them for the rest of my days."),面对着严重生活危机。在片中可以发现,这些个人经历大部分被归在了Freddie而非Dodd身上。
于是在电影中,从Hubbard分离出了Freddie和Dodd,把Hubbard的自我治疗转换成了Dodd对Freddie的治疗。这样做我觉得可以在这两个角色间形成相互参照的关系,在1950年左右美国的时代气氛中表现了两种人生选择间的冲突。
用导演Paul Thomas Anderson(PTA)自己的话来说,这个时代是“Starting with a kind of victory, but at what cost? Obviously a lot of lives, a lot of damage and a lot of sadness. A lot of death, a lot of question marks around for people. So, you have this kind of push of optimism but this cloud of tragedy over everything. I don't know, when I was growing up I saw World War II films and everything was very heroic, you got this sense growing up where I come from, in America, this sense that we won something. We did something great, how could anybody be sad about that? Obviously it was quite different as I grew up and I got older, I realized that's not how it was.”
开始是二战胜利,可代价是很多的人命、损失和悲伤,一方面乐观主义的精神在推动社会,可同时好像所有事都笼罩在一种悲剧的气氛中,在这个时代背景下,产生了各种疑问,给了科学教之类产生的土壤。
此外PTA还提到过,像Freddie 那样的人在战争中习惯了有序、服从长官(某种意义上的master)命令的生活,战争之后,他突然失去了指引,不知所措,只好在社会中盲打瞎撞,处处受阻。在片中,Dodd的生活是很光鲜,但我觉得可以想象他经历了和Freddie一样的问题,只是和Hubbard一样,尽力克服了这种困难并融入了社会,虽然他仍然被不断攻击质疑,不得安宁。
这有点接近Philip Seymour Hoffman对他饰演的Dodd的解读(PTA说比他自己总结的还好,也可能是客套~):“They're coming from different places but they're more the same, they're both wild beasts I think. One of them has just tamed it somehow and he's trying to teach other people how to do that. But ultimately that's where the doubt comes in, where the whole reluctant prophet thing comes in. Ultimately, he wants to be wild like Freddie is, so there's this real attraction there over those two very things: wanting to be tame it and wanting to be wild. I think that's basically what life is. I think that's what we'd wake up every morning going, '****, why can't I just run naked through the streets of Venice and just eat and shit. Why can't I just do that and have it be okay? Is it possible that I can just have sex with everyone I see today? No I can't. But I wish that was possible. So I think I'm just going to go find my Master, he'll teach me how not to do that. ”
Dodd和Freddie虽说出身不同,但都是“野兽”,其中Dodd学会了怎么抑制自己的欲望,然后就去教别人,虽然从根本上说他还是想像Freddie那样。所以在Hoffman看来,这片反映了被社会制度驯服和自由意志的永恒对立。大师会去指导一个人如何克制自己的欲望,成为社会能接纳的“正常人”。
而且电影中确实也验证了Hoffman的说法,表现出Dodd和Freddie一样,性格中也有很强的非理性、癫狂、“兽性”的元素(他能从Freddie那得到写作灵感的原因可能就在于此)。Dodd面对别人质疑时非常容易暴怒,他的理论则接近巫术,电影里有一位质疑者更直接指出他是非理性的。此外最明显的就是舞会那段,他简直发狂了。
对于这一段,PTA的点评不错: “What I like most about that night was I thought here is a person who can seemingly drink anybody under the table – drink anything and still be standing – and here he is crumpled into the corner. This is somebody who has absolutely met his match – at a point that hes sinking and passed out – this guy’s just getting started. That’s my favorite part about that. It’s not the women and all that – it’s he’s still going and he can out-party Freddie. ”
简单来说就是Freddie都已经醉到不行了,结果Dodd仍然意犹未尽,他压抑的激情比Freddie还要强烈。
两人的共同爱好也同样说明了他们性格的这种共通之处。Freddie擅长酿酒,Dodd也是最能享受他这种创造的人。这容易就让人联想到所谓的“酒神精神”,激情和非理性的代表。 两个人也都喜欢呆在海上,而海水也是非理性、潜意识的象征,就像福柯所指出的:“水域和疯癫长期以来就在欧洲人的梦幻中相互联系着。” “疯癫是人身上晦暗的水质的表征。水质是一种晦暗的无序状态、一种流动的混沌,是一切事物的发端和归宿,是与明快和成熟稳定的精神相对立的。” Dodd的那艘游艇,是否就是现代版的愚人船呢?
尽管如此,两人最终还是选择了相反的人生方向。虽然Dodd仍然被崇尚科学理性的主流社会质疑和排斥,烦恼不断,但他已经习惯于去适应社会(或者说被社会控制?),离不开了。舞会之后,Amy Adams演的他的妻子(社会束缚的代表?)替他手淫发泄,这里应该是在和开头Freddie在沙滩手淫作对比,指出两人的不同。摩托车那段可能也可以体现这点,Dodd虽然可以暂时疯狂,但还要回到原点:家庭(女儿和女婿)和社会规范去,而Freddie仍可以自由离开。
相反的,Freddie则选择孤独,活在自己的世界中,放纵自己被本能激情控制。他做出这种选择的原因可以参考PTA对他的点评:
“I guess he is somebody who will probably move the rest of his life alone and sort of learn to survive alone. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t completely hunger or desire to be around people or to be part of something. But the second he feels too much good will in the room is probably the moment he’s going to slip. That much love and attention is probably worth bailing on for somebody like him. ”
也就是说他不是完全不想融入人群,可是一旦他发现别人对他有了很深的感情,对他关怀太多, 他就想要逃离,因为这种个性,他恐怕难逃孤独一生的命运。
Freddie的这种个性虽然可以理解成一种追求自由独立的天性,但从电影中的证据来看更可能是家庭生活创伤的结果。他的父亲死于酗酒,母亲关在精神病院,特别是母亲的情况,他在第一次被Dodd“治疗”时最痛苦的就是这一点。可以想象在这样的家庭长大应该是很不快乐的,而电影开始时他和医生提到的梦就是他和父母一块喝酒的“合家欢”场景,体现了他这方面的遗憾。值得一提的是在讲述完这个梦后电影马上溶接到Freddie拍摄的那些看起来十分美好的50年代美国标准生活照,这样做一方面讽刺了这种理想生活的虚假性,反映了前面引用的PTA对那个时代的理解,一方面似乎也暗示了这种生活对Freddie来说和他的梦一样,他永远只能“在画面外”,没办法真正进入其中。 Dodd对他来说也是类似父亲的替代(那位Freddie特别提及像他父亲的工友被毒死的酒,Dodd喝起来却很享受,可能也说明Dodd相比下是个更强大的“父亲”)。
但Freddie最终还是对家庭生活没有信心,无论是Dodd和他的宗教团体这种家庭的替代品,还是Doris(Doris当时都已经答应他不去挪威了,他还是选择先离开一段时间,结果一去七年)。我想第二次治疗时Dodd的女婿就戳到了他心里的痛处:可能是因为他觉得自己和母亲一样,都属于精神病院这种被主流社会排斥的世界,他害怕会和Doris重蹈父母的命运。他离开Dodd,可能也有这方面的原因(在和Dodd最后一次会面时,Freddie愿意做帮他拍照的工作,只想和Dodd维持这种较疏远、短期的联系,但Dodd的妻子不允许:“我们不要拍照的,弗雷迪.你要不就永远做下去,要不就不要做”。)。
这样看来,片名里的master是指什么呢?按前面提到的Hoffman的解读,可以说最根本的master是社会制度,但我想这片说得更宽泛,比如人与人之间也有“主”与“奴”的关系,Amy Adams和Dodd之间(按PTA的说法,在那场手淫戏里,她是Dodd的master),Dodd和Freddie之间。
而Freddie在结尾时真的是摆脱了master的自由状态吗?应该也不是,因为他的生活被自己的情绪、封闭性格和创伤所奴役了,虽然在一定程度上逃离了社会的束缚,但却被困在自设的心理牢笼中。他面容憔悴,酗酒,肾有毛病,而且就像PTA说的,他不是不想融入社会,只是他做不到而已,也就是说他丧失了自己的健康,且失去了选择融入社会的自由。福柯在《疯癫与文明》里的这段话好像就可以形容他:
“水域和航行确实扮演了这种角色。狂人被困在船上,无处逃遁。他被送到干支百叉的江河上或茫茫无际的大海上,也就被送交给脱离尘世的、不可捉摸的命运;他成了最自由、最开放的地方的囚徒:被牢牢束缚在有无数去向的路口。他是最卓越的旅客,也就是说被囚禁在旅行状态之中。他将去的地方是未知的,正如他一旦下了船,他来自何方也是未知的。只有在两个都不属于他的世界之间的不毛之地里,才有他的真理和他的故乡。”
于是,两个人都处在受困的状态中,同病相怜。Dodd在和Freddie最后一次会面时说希望他能找出一种没有master的生活方式,并说还没人曾做到这一点,这说明他不认为自己做到了,也不认为Freddie原来那种生活是。因此,我觉得这片最终还是关于人如何才能达到真正“自由”、快乐的状态,一个无解的难题。
另外关于宗教信仰的问题,PTA的回答很有趣:
“Q: The Master appears like the continuation of There Will Be Blood: as if with every film you were telling a new chapter of the history of American and its relation with religious faith.
PTA: Oddly, I'm not fascinated by the theme of faith. What means something for me, it's the faith in someone. In There Will Be Blood, people had faith in Eli, they believed in him. The audience which assisted at Tom Cruise's conference in Magnolia drank his words. And Freddie has faith in Dodd.”
这么说来,包括《血色将至》、《木兰花》等前作,一直以来吸引PTA的不是信仰问题,而是人之间的信任关系,在这片里就是Freddie对Dodd这个人的信任。而且我想Freddie 始终没有真正相信 Dodd的理论。有个细节似乎可以说明这一点:片中特别点出的Dodd的一条具体教义是人的灵魂存在在整个时间中,存在在很多躯体里,并且他能让人回忆起前世的生命和创伤,这也是他治疗理论的关键。可是在电影里他能让Freddie回忆起的只有关于Doris、母亲等等的今生的经历,而前世的经历,都只有Dodd片尾处直接告诉Freddie的那些。这样在两个人交流中就排除了Dodd理论比较“玄”的那部分,基本只是一个人设法帮助另一个人走出心灵困境而已(无论真实动机如何)。这片感兴趣的,还是这种人之间的关系。