巴黎艳遇

　　米哈伊尔·阿法纳西耶维奇·布尔加科夫1891年生于基辅，1940年逝世于莫斯科。世界文坛称他是一位思想深邃、以大无畏精神向一切邪恶挑战的文学大师。其代表作《狗心》、《白卫军》、《大师和玛格丽特》等曾被苏联当局查禁没收，或“默杀”。作家死后恢复名誉、苏联文坛两度掀起“布尔加科夫热”。现在他的作品进入现代经典之列，被誉为20世纪最伟大的文学珍品之一。　　《狗心》作于一九二五年初，在文学圈子里获得一致好评，人们发现它确实尖锐地抨击了现实，但它抨击的是现实中的粗野、愚昧和荒廖。小说写一条狗因为做了人的脑垂体移植手术，突然成了有人外表的流氓，致使流氓习气随着脑垂体分泌的激素，渗入了取名沙里科夫的实验室怪物的每个细胞。沙里科夫的可怕不公在于他身上那些流氓无产者的劣性，并且在于他对社会主义的庸俗化.表面上看来，《狗心》很像一个科幻故事，但是实际上却有着反乌托邦小说的关于哲理和社会的深邃思考。　　国际知名的医生菲利普·普列奥布拉任斯基教授，为了进行改善人种的优生学试验，把一个刚刚死去的行窃的酒鬼的脑垂体和睾丸移到一只叫沙里克的狗身上。沙里克竟变成了“还处于最低发展阶段的”人——沙里科夫。　　这个能讲人言、衣食如人的衣冠禽兽，一天天显示出是一个怀着“一颗最为卑鄙龌龊的心”的败类：酗酒、偷窃、说谎、告密、无耻下流，直至栽脏陷害、用手枪威胁要强占教授的住宅。更有意味的是，这个狗“出身”的沙里科夫竟然被政府赏识而任命为莫斯科公共卫生局清除流窜动物科科长。他穿上了皮夹克(这是当时文学作品里革命者的形象模式)，出入有专车——尽管是卡车。幸而两位“造物主”普列奥布拉任斯基教授和博尔缅塔尔大夫及时用手术把沙里科夫还原为沙里克，才没酿成惨祸。　　在这篇小说里，布尔加科夫力究天人之际，思考着人与自然、人与社会的关系、人的能力限度以及人对于整个自然界的责任。实际上，布尔加科夫继续阐释着一个重大的主题：人不应该僭越，不应该觊觎全能的上帝的位置。这个上帝便是自然、社会的客观法则。试图超越社会、自然的进程，把科学变为破坏客观规律的迷信，狂热蛮干地“创造历史”，是不能不受到惩罚的。正如小说《不祥之蛋》中，佩尔西科夫教授虽然掌握了科学，却缺乏对人类社会的责任感，最后死于疯狂的群众的乱拳之下；而给人类社会带来可怖的厄运的洛克，急功近利而智力低下到根本谈不上什么责任感问题，却“带着官家的公文”，则是更为可怕的。　　而在《狗心》中，国际首屈一指的名医菲利普·普列奥布拉任斯基教授空前绝后的完美手术只能创造出险些置其于死地的社会败类。普列奥布拉任斯基教授经受了自作自受的“科学实验”之后，终于觉悟道：“看吧，如果一个研究者不是摸着大自然的脉搏，与之共进，而是想加速问题的解决，揭开那神秘的帷幕，那么，就给你个沙里科夫尝尝，还让你吃不了兜着走。”　　看来，人要充当上帝——造物主的角色，结果只能是对上帝的讽刺性模拟。干扰世界的客观进程最终只能落得搬起石头砸自己的脚的下场。

　　「人可生如蚁而美如神」：一班裁制亮丽戏服的中年裁缝慨叹自己生如蚁，一名奥斯卡导演拍出她们美如神的生命。导演邀约一众他热爱的演员，重塑一家高级裁缝工作室色彩斑斓、五味集陈的过往，追忆70年代一班坚毅温柔的女裁缝的故事：表面盛势凌人却细腻体贴的老板、善良却抑郁的妹妹拍档、单纯的寡妇和她的小儿子、偏爱小鲜肉的姨姨、被家暴的妻子、昔日美艳的舞者、逃避通缉的少女⋯⋯一群日常女子抛开小我、互相照顾，照亮平凡生活中超越自我的不平凡，展现她们的独立、爱欲、挣扎和力量。意大利金像奖观众人次最高奖意大利银丝带奖年度电影

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.