新冠初愈，但又激起了慢性病。回到西安的這幾天，上空總是霧蒙蒙的，是曆史的重擔将這座城市壓得也喘不過氣來嗎？不過附近的影院居然放映戈達爾，立即跑去看了。
重溫這部 《随心所欲：一部由十二個插曲組成的影片》應該遵循卡爾維諾的教導，重新下一番虔誠的功夫。于是找來了可能是最重要、最“權威”的兩份評論，順便貼在豆瓣上。
從《随心所欲》談起 面向蒙特利爾電影藝術學院學生的電影史課程 摘自《電影的七段航程》譯/郭昭澄
《随心所欲》（Vivre sa vie）的拍攝年代距今太遙遠了，我一點也記不起來當時的情形。我在重看自己的一些舊片時，常會感到很驚訝，我發現我現在才開始稍微能夠分辨兩種截然不同的動作，一種是引發出某些東西的動作，叫做表達（expression），另一種是相反的動作，即烙印某種東西的動作，叫做印象感覺（impression）。對于一般的制片人而言，拍電影就是在底片上印記一些東西，就像印刷書籍一樣。制片人從事電影制片的工作，這是他的職業，他在印記某些東西。此外，印象這個字當動詞時，我們也說“使人印象深刻”（impressionner），或是說某種風景或某部影片令我們“留下深刻印象”。
在我開始搞電影時，我常以為我在表達自己的思想見解，卻不知道在這項表達動作中，其實有一大部分隻是印記感覺印象的動作，這個印記動作并非來自我們本身。我一切的工作或者說我從事電影工作的樂趣，就是盡量主動去尋求、去學習自己對事物的感覺，而不是被動地接受外界加諸我的印象或感覺，至少對我而言是如此，但這并非容易之事。
當我重看《随心所欲》時，發現拍片當時我已稍微能夠表達出一點自己的東西，我在各方面都印記上一些東西，且絲毫未加控制，因此使得這部片子有些很嚴重的瑕疵，不過片中有時又會突然出現一些還不錯的東西，問題是當時我分辨不出什麼是好鏡頭，什麼是壞鏡頭。如今我才開始了解這一點，但我也隻能說：“對啦，我将一個鏡頭接着另一個鏡頭，但事實上這并非出自我自己的動作， 這是電影和我所在的社會所做的動作，是處在那個時代的我使我繼續如此行事罷了。”
我對于自己曾想拍一些警匪片的念頭感到驚訝，現在我比較喜歡看一些稍帶曆史色彩的書籍，比方一些關于黑手黨或一些“道上”的事，隻要有關曆史或政治的事都令我感興趣。但在拍攝《随心所欲》時，我僅在抄襲一些東西……反正，那是我當時的拍片方式；這和當時大部分的人喜歡看警匪片的道理是一樣的。我和大家一樣都很喜歡這類電影，可是我并不知道自己是在何種社會現象中，因此在處理匪徒之間的争端時相當可笑。今天，随便一部克林特·伊斯特伍德（Clint Eastwood）的電影都比《随心所欲》好。有時我也會去看克林特·伊斯特伍德的電影，我是用社會學的觀點去看，因為他的電影都屬于美國一般普通電影、B級電影、希區柯克式電影。他的電影老少鹹宜，不過這種電影的魅力并非因為這個十足的王八蛋具有卓越的自我表達（expression）能力，而是因為這個王八蛋具有某種讨人喜歡且令人印象深刻（impression）的能耐，甚至包括我在内，連我也會花五美元去看他的電影。因此，我們可以說他的電影是某種世界的展現表達（expression）。
最近我剛在巴黎看了一部他的電影，所以才有感而發。我想看看非電視影集的一般電影到底是什麼樣子，以及克林特·伊斯特伍德在某個時期由演而導的過程與原因，或許是基于經濟因素才當導演吧，反正我也不太清楚。總之，我很想知道一個人如何會突然說：“好吧，把攝影機擺那兒，然後我要用這種方式來拍自己，我将會成為某個角色……”他憑什麼突然由幕前走到幕後？我自忖怎麼會如此，我不知道答案，因為這也正是我提出的問題，我也想一探究竟。我對他的電影極感興趣，因為他的電影有觀衆群，我正好可以藉此看出人類活在何種世界中？我們常說：人活在這個世界中……；事實上，一般美國普通百姓就是那些會說“把攝影機擺那邊，我們要拍一個警察正在做這做那的動作”這種話的人，我想，就憑這一點，他的電影比我的實際多了，因為他的品味符合一般大衆的要求。有了這個覺醒後我就較少拍警匪片，因為我不會拍這種符合大衆口味的電影。但說真格的，我和一般大衆一樣，向來對包括偵探小說在内一切與警察有關的東西相當着迷。
開始時，每個人都自認對事情有其主觀的看法，可是，随後卻發現這種主觀性并不如我們以為的那麼獨立，而是被其他的東西所左右；因此我們應該試着去分析此種主觀性，去除其中的外在客觀因素，然後才能找到自己真正的獨立主觀性。我就可以透過影像看出并認出此種主觀性，舉例來說，今早放映《貪婪》（Greed）的序幕一景十分精彩：這一段有七、八個鏡頭，施特羅海姆（Erich von Stroheim）和俄國人一樣使用字幕這一點非常有意思；字幕是鏡頭的一部分，有些時候無聲電影豐富的表達力，強過很多有聲電影，或許是默片的字幕不受限于演員嘴部的動作，與對白的長度無關，可以表達更多的東西之故吧。
施特羅海姆是賦予鏡頭和角度同等價值的先驅者之一，俄國人随後也跟進。在《貪婪》中，有七、八個序幕鏡頭，叙述某個人正在做某件事情，随後出現字幕“這就是”，鏡頭又出現母親的影像，過了三個鏡頭後字幕才打出“這就是他的母親”。說真的，這就是電影曾經具有的強大威力，可惜如今這項功能已消失殆盡。過去曾經有一段時間，電影與文學或語言曾有過美好的合作，彼此相得益彰。
新浪潮在開始拍電影之初，是基于對當時電影的一種反彈，是一種重返自然、真實的反應動作。我們反對當時的電影制作方式，特别是對白部分。我記得在拍《精疲力盡》（À bout de souffle）之前，曾替一家叫《藝術》（Arts）的報紙寫過兩、三星期的文章，我從一些影片中撷取某些所謂的“陳腔濫調”的句子放入文章中，别人就說：“從來沒有人會在這種情況下說出這種話。”舉例來說，有一個叫米歇爾·奧迪亞（Michel Audiard）的電影對白編劇，他每次寫對白之前就先跑到街上去聽聽市井小民如何說話，再把記錄下的句子編成電影對白。這種對白效果第一次還不錯，第二次也不錯，可是一連重複個十次就開始令人覺得厭煩了。當時新浪潮的人都在寫影評，于是我們就毫不客氣地指出上述現象，毫無忌憚地抨擊這種乏善可陳的對白，這就是為什麼當時有那麼多人讨厭我們的原因。就好像今天你對一個朋友說：“你應該在電影中說出某些話，應該寫出某些對白才對。”此時你的朋友一定會很不高興，他會說：“你幹脆直說我不會寫算了。”當時我們一票人都直截了當毫不掩飾地說：“碧姬·芭铎（Brigitte Bardot）不應該在某片中說那些話，而應該說這些話才對。”
随後，我們（新浪潮）由于經常觀察别人的作品，大量評論電影，終于也發現了自己特有的風格。隻要腦中閃過什麼東西，我們就把它記下來，并不特别去琢磨或思考。
電影圈或是一般人所謂的“說故事”這種事一直令我覺得非常不自在，所謂的說故事就是由零時開始，開一個頭，然後抵達終點，這種事美國人做得很少，但大家卻認為他們一直在做。假如換做是别人的話這事就行不通了，但美國人卻可以。……所有的美國西部片不都如此嗎？美國西部片開始時一定會有一個不知由何處冒出來的家夥，砰然一聲推開酒吧的門，劇終時他就突然消失不見，就這麼簡單。影片沒頭沒尾的，隻呈現那家夥的一部分，奇怪的是，美國人這種拍攝手法卻能令人相信曆經了一則完整的故事，或許這就是美國人的威力所在吧，其他人是無法辦到的。其他的人都叙述一個開端，一個開場白，再來是中段情節，然後是結局……我對這種事覺得很不自在，我從未成功地從頭到尾說完一則完整的故事。
我開始拍電影時僅拍一些故事的片段（morceau），就這麼一直拍下去，到最後我就隻拍些片段，我甚至比較喜歡為電視台拍片，因他們接受片段式影片。他們會對你說：拍一段在星期一播出，一段在星期二播出，一段在星期三播出……隻要拍七個段落就成了一集。反正我甯願嘗試拍電視節目，因為時間夠充裕，觀衆可以在電視影集中找出故事原委，但若想在一個半小時或兩小時内說出一則完整故事，那就難了。為什麼規定一定要在一小時半或兩小時内把故事說完呢？大家都不知道理由。電視影集是由一些片段組成，可以透過影集畫些畫、做點音樂，影集中想當然爾由節奏、變奏和一些段落（morceau）所組成。再說，在音樂上我們都說“一曲音樂”（un morceau de musique）。
……在這個時候，我們有點脫離故事情節，或是相反地，我們在研究故事，在尋找其連貫線索、一個或數個主題，或某種東西……；反正我們試着在找就是了，那時我也是在尋找……我記得《随心所欲》的腳本改編自一個法官寫的關于賣淫的小說；換言之，我隻是想揭發一些不能公開的事，希望别人能夠藉此和我讨論并對我說：“你可以和我讨論……”但我隻想叙述故事而已，随後就會跑出一些東西來。我們一旦描述了一種情況後就會特别喜歡曾有這類遭遇的人，就可以想象一個人物或某些場景……這就是拍電影比其他行業有意思的地方。
……當我們更能厘清什麼是客觀的東西并且加以控制時，我們就更容易找到自己的主觀性。假如你很會說故事的話，到了某個時刻就可以讓主觀性自由奔馳。……何況當時（拍《随心所欲》之時）的電影檢查與今天并不一樣；比方說這部影片應該放入更多的文章，而不是影像才對；假如影片隻要叙述十或十五分鐘的色情交易，就應該呈現出其他不同的色情交易情節才對。假如我們實地拍攝一節十分鐘的色情交易過程，看到的東西就不及一段同樣長度的相關影片所能呈現的多，這就是電影的好處。電影時間比實際時間更具伸展性，我們可以在這段描述色情交易的十分鐘影片中，把焦點放在嫖客或妓女身上，也就是說可以有自己的主觀性，也就是電影的構想，而這個構想是根據别人已做的事為出發點。至于我嘛，我是根據某部紀錄片來拍《随心所欲》，我經常拿一些不是自己構想的點子來拍片，我自己是不可能會有那麼多點子的……至少我可以拿别人的東西做個大綱。現在我則試着拿一些别人拍過的影像，前前後後再加上一些其他的影像，如此就成了我的電影。
安娜·卡裡娜（Anna Karina）拍完《随心所欲》後非常生氣，她認為我們将她拍得很醜，她也怪我叫她演這部片子，這就是我們感情發生裂痕的開端。我很有興趣重看這部片子，這可能是我在潛意識裡想模仿影圈著名夫婦檔的例子吧，就像瑪琳·黛德麗（Marlène Dietrich）和約瑟夫·馮·斯登堡（Josef von Sternberg）的故事一樣……在新浪潮方興未艾之時，對于我們這些未來的導演而言，我們心目中的明星是導演，而非演員。我很佩服一些如半神半人般的導演，或許他們可以取代從未被我崇拜過的父母吧……反正一大堆諸如此類的事。與女演員發生關系就好像我是嫖客，而她是妓女一樣……當然，男演員或女演員是一個值得好好研究的行業。但事實上，我常有一個問題……我不能……當我和卡裡娜分開時……她是因為我有一大堆缺點而離開我，我也明白我之所以離開她的原因，是因為我無法與她談論電影之故，況且我們也看不出有什麼辦法能夠使彼此溝通，或許需要有另一種社會運動來促成吧。我認為卡裡娜是個很不錯的演員，她是北歐人，有很多優點，她的演技有點類似瑞典女星葛麗泰·嘉寶（Greta Garbo），太過戲劇化，有時根本就不需要使氣氛變得那麼嚴肅，但她就是沒辦法放輕松；不過這是她自己的動作，一點也不像動物，不如說像植物吧。何況她又是丹麥人，她會如此演戲應該不是件奇怪的事。提到卡裡娜就一言難盡，今天我才了解到我們要的東西從來沒有一次相同過，這就好像我們想和攝影師談攝影以外的東西一樣。
我還有另外一次經驗是在電視台，那時我一直與同一位攝影師工作，我們正在拍制一個兒童訪問節目。我就想：“這件事一定非常簡單，至少這個攝影師有小孩，應該會比别人開放一點，也許他看到訪問或我與小女孩的對話時會建議我說：‘依我看你一定沒有小孩，你不應該問他們這些問題。’”事實卻不然，因為有這麼一種尊敬、一種階級關系或是一種各司其職的專業觀念存在，使得攝影師不敢對我的工作提出質疑，這也正是我和卡裡娜之間的問題：由于我是高高在上的導演，她是我手下的演員，因此我們之間可說毫無對話溝通的可能。我認為以當時的我而言，照理說應該會逼她說出自己的意見才對，我應該是無法容忍無溝通的情況才對，可是我卻毫無動作，而她也無力反抗那種不公平待遇。簡·方達（Jane Fonda）一直在電影圈之外積極活動，但卻從不在圈内活動。這是我和她之間一個很大的差異，我們在合作拍片期間多次起争執原因就在此。我對越南一點興趣也沒有，我對簡·方達說：“假如你連這個鏡頭都演不好的話，那麼就算到了越南你照樣不會演得好。至少在電影中還有我幫你寫對白來彌補一下你差勁的演技，到了越南誰來幫你寫對白呢？”
電影既不是工廠，也不是通用汽車公司；我不是福特公司，也不是美國中央情報局局長。假如有人想攻擊我的話，那是很簡單的事，趁我在拍片時打擊我是易如反掌的事。在座的各位若想攻擊我的話也不是什麼難事，就像通用公司的工人可以輕而易舉地去打擊工頭一樣。問題是，假如不是用拳頭攻擊而是用言論的話，這其中一定大有文章。在電影中，馮·斯登堡并沒用槍抵着瑪琳·黛德麗，她就乖乖聽命，可見其中存在其他的問題。這并不是說沒有暴力關系存在，所以我就不用言語當作武器。今天導演在尋求與别人共同協商如何相處、如何擺設物件，以及如何将自己當成一件物來表現，我們發現這些不是那麼簡單的。
最近我剛看了一部德菲因·塞裡格（Delphine Seyrig）的影片，裡面有很多著名女星的訪問報導，導演希望她們在片中談談女性角色在電影中的地位。每個女明星都說：“喲不，我沒空，我無法談這個……”我在想：這實在太不像話了，影片中根本沒有出現她們演的電影的片段，應該插入這些片段，好讓我們對她們的作品有些概念，然後再聽聽她們的解釋：“在那部片子中，我想有些事是我自己願意接受的。”演電影畢竟與在工廠工作不同呀！随後，可能的話最好也要訪問未出現在攝影機前的所有女性電影從業人員。這些人通常是臨時演員，其次是在辦公室裡打制片預算的打字小姐、沖印廠的女工和做其他相關工作的女工……這是電影的另一面。
對我而言，演員就是一個想表達的人……而事實上，演員卻像一個既珍貴又稀奇的病人，他隻能诠釋别人的角色，有些事想做又不能做，與殘障者差不多，所以他可說處于一個極特殊的狀況。而且他也不能把個人的感覺（impression）放入所演的角色中。問題是演員不可能一直僅在攝影機之前表演，不參與其他事務；同樣地，導演也不可能一直站在攝影機之後指揮其他演員表演，有時也要充當一下演員才對，至于其他處于攝影機旁的技術人員也不可能一直隻當個旁觀者。到目前為止，我也不認為有分開工作任務的可能。當然，有時為了演好某個角色，每個人都必須要具備某些特殊優點，這是毋庸置疑的。這就和唱歌一樣，問題是唱歌……我不知道，通常歌手很容易受制于經紀人。我認為芭芭拉·史翠珊（Barbra Streisand）的嗓音很美，她憑着美妙的歌喉在歌壇上出類拔萃，如同默片和有聲電影時的葛麗泰·嘉寶或是埃米爾·雅甯斯（Emil Jannings）一樣，他們憑着完美軀體和精湛演技在同行中獨占鳌頭。但是芭芭拉·史翠珊光唱歌，并沒有參與歌詞寫作的工作，所以歌詞内容與她的聲音特質無法配合。換言之，應該知道如何各取所長，才能發揮最大功效。
開始時，我與卡裡娜非常相愛，共同分享彼此的優點，也忍受彼此的缺點；但到了最後，我隻能說是電影把我們完全分開了。我想她一直很遺憾不能去好萊塢拍電影，假如她能去的話或許會更快樂一點。假如她真的想去好萊塢闖天下的話，最好早生二十年，而且還要有機會去洛杉矶才行。
從前我們新浪潮拍電影的方式和現在的電影工作者不一樣，我們必須能夠以拍片維生才行。想要維持正常的生活就必須正常地拍電影，除了必須能夠負擔三房一廳的公寓、汽車、假期等開銷，還要拍些大家喜歡的電影才行。但是我們也不會為了達到上述目的，而委屈自己去拍些廣告片、豔情片或是政治宣導片……反正，我不知道，就是去做些大部分人做的事，一起同流合污——我們并沒有這樣。我們也沒有像大部分的歐洲導演一樣，被迫跑到美國去求發展。總之，我們備極艱辛地做了一些想做的事，絕不妥協去拍那些色情片、政治片等等，我們也成功了。但是，我們同時也蜷縮在自己的小角落，覺得非常孤單，不禁會想：“實在很可惜，我們具備所有拍片條件，可是……”後來我們發現到，大家并不太想改變，這個世界也無意改變。
我經常在想，電影實在是一種相當特别的東西。很早以前就有了影像，但當影像達到如電視發展的普遍程度時，它給予人的一般印象卻在反映一種社會、民族的病态而非健康狀況。影像能夠表現一些無限的東西，同時又多方受到限制。影像和聲音各自并不太完整，假如我們的身體隻具備眼睛和耳朵的話，就不算是一具完整的軀體。眼睛和耳朵非常有限，但這個“非常有限”的東西卻又予人一種無限的印象，由零至無限，綿延不斷。
我經常在想，今日的電影有點類似從前的音樂：它代表一切将發生的事，能把未來會發生的重大趨勢預先印記呈現出來。由此看來，電影勢必也能預先呈現弊端，這是事情本質顯現于外的記号。電影非常特别，能預測突發的意外事故。
我們應該多拍些戰争電影，而不要去打仗。科波拉（Francis Ford Coppola）應該早二十年拍那些戰争電影才對，如此或許可以避免不必要的戰火。影像本身一點也不危險，影像其實非常有意思，什麼東西都可以放進去。我經常與朋友起争執，因為我常對他們說：“我要将自己表現出來，我要将自己在影像中放大表現出來，你們可以盡量批評我，沒關系。”我認為，我們必須将自己呈現出來，并且呈現出我們對别人的看法，在這個時候，别人就可以對你說：“但我并不是這樣子呀！”如此一來彼此就有點溝通，可以稍微相互了解了。事實上，有一種折衷辦法可以幫我們彼此了解。我們可以用一種更明顯、更有趣、更直接可行的方式去增進彼此間的了解。當嬰孩出生或老年人臨終之際，他們都不說話，隻用眼睛去凝視，當我們閉上嘴巴而用眼去看時，就可以看到、了解到更多的東西。
說真的，當時我們一群人開始拍電影時，一心隻想拍與電影史有關的題材，隻想拍一些有别于當時電影的作品，這種志向顯得有點劃地自限。同時，我們又摻入過多自己的主觀，到最後不僅看不清想表現的東西，也偏離了影史的方向。我想裡維特（Jacques Rivette）或特呂弗（François Truffaut）等人都是這麼上路的。當時新浪潮的出發點是一種反法國電影的反應，而今天……每個人都各自走出自己的路。為什麼夏布洛爾（Claude Chabrol）會變成像杜維威爾（Julien Duvivier）那樣的導演呢？杜維威爾不是一個壞人，但是我可不願變得像他一樣。特呂弗的曆練算是最奇特的一個，明天我們會放一部他的電影片段，然後再與其他的影片片段做個比較……特呂弗的世界是一個很怪異的世界。
至于我嘛，我則嘗試去拍一些有人要看的電影，或是與一些想要為自己拍片的人一起來拍電影。這就像醫生需要X光底片，而病人也需要醫生的道理是一樣的。某些時候，病人和醫生雙方都需要有X光底片，這樣彼此才能相互産生關系。我一直嘗試用這種态度去拍片，也就是說去感覺此種需求。事實上，我有一方面很像學生，或者說是永遠在學習的學生，或永遠的老師吧！或許是教學相長的道理，反正我也不知道到底是什麼……總之，我覺得一直有一種想要看得更遠、想要制造東西、學習經驗以及詳讀一張地圖以便旅行的欲望。
對了，對大部分的電影工作人員而言，“考慮到觀衆的需求”這句話隻是一個大騙局罷了。當他們說“必須考慮到觀衆、尊敬觀衆”，“必須考慮到這種電影可能會令觀衆感到乏味”時……尤其是當觀衆覺得乏味時他們就不會去看了，假如說這句話的人同時也投資這部影片，那他準會虧大錢。他們還不如坦白直說：“我應該試着去吸引最多的觀衆，好讓我賺最多的錢。”賺錢是一件好事，隻要坦白說出來就好了，不要假惺惺地說“必須不能令觀衆感到乏味”“不要……”等冠冕堂皇的大話。
長久以來，我拍片的首要動機都是基于我自己相信的真理，我的想法是：“大家不停地談到觀衆，我可不認識觀衆，我從來沒看過他們，也不知道他們是誰。”隻有在票房慘遭滑鐵盧時我才會想到觀衆的存在。例如《卡賓槍手》（Les Carabiniers）上演時，十五天内隻有區區十八名觀衆，閉着眼都可以數得出來，這時我便想說：“這些人到底是誰呀？我倒想認識他們！我想看看這十八個來看電影的人，希望有人拿他們的照片給我看……”雖然是在票房奇慘的時刻我才第一次真正想到觀衆的存在，我到底還是想到了觀衆。我就不認為斯皮爾伯格（Steven Spielberg）會想到觀衆，請問他如何有能力去想到、考慮到一千兩百萬觀衆呢？他的制片人可能會想到由荷包掏出的一千兩百萬美元，但要他想到一千兩百萬名觀衆……這是絕對不可能的事。或許會有人與他的想法一樣，但還要看看他們到底是哪些人。我的女兒看我的電影常常無法坐上五分鐘，卻可以忍受好幾個小時的廣告和美國影集，我看到這種情況真是百感交集。我不能怪她，心想說“這樣做一點用處也沒有”，可是卻又忍不住不怪她。有時想到還要養她就令我厭煩，在這個時候我就會想到觀衆，此時，我與他們間有一種實際的關系。
當你在拍一部電影時，你突然大膽說出一些本來不敢說的話（如髒話等），因為這是在銀幕上出現，所以你不會覺得不好意思。當我們拍電影時，不會因為觀衆是中國人、阿富汗人、黑人、瑞士人或波蘭人而覺得不自在，這是因為我們并不認識這些觀衆的緣故。我甚至不知道有誰會去看我的電影，當然就不會覺得不自在或不好意思。可是，當我離開巴黎搬到外省時，因我住的是一個小城市，瑞士也是一個民風極保守的國家，當我一想到在這種小地方連我認識的那個肉販都會去看我的電影時，這一切就不一樣了。我拍的是電視節目，我知道他将會去看我拍的影像，我也知道他的兒子和我的女兒在同一所小學……在小鎮或是某些保守國家中，這一切因素都會影響拍片的态度，這種狹隘的地理與人際關系會影響我拍片的心情，這時候我就會開始想到觀衆。針對這一點，電視實在比電影有意思多了。這時要想的問題并不是有哪一種觀衆會去看，而是……“有些人會去看這些作品”的問題。說實在的，假如稍後我再把這些電視節目重拍成電影的話，我必定會想到去看電影的人，那麼我會再次變得不知所措，我會想：“這些電影會在哪一間電影院放映？觀衆會在哪些條件下看電影？”這些觀影條件暧昧不明，令我有點不知所措。我一方面想要拍電影，一方面又想到自己沒能力去做想做的事，因為一做的話就有了立場，不是居下風就是成為支配者，而我既不想居下風也不想當支配者。因此，我想最好就是拍拍社區的小型電視節目就好了。唉，可惜并沒有這種小型電視節目可拍。
有哪一個派拉蒙的人會想到觀衆？導演是不會想到觀衆的，依我看，假如他曾經曆過新浪潮所經曆的類似過程，他或許最後會想到觀衆。換句話說，假如他在某些時候的某些地方接收到觀衆對他的作品的反應時，他或許就會想到觀衆。這時電視機就扮演舉足輕重的角色了，電視的播放次數頻繁、人數多且有立即反應。像《第二号》（Numéro Deux）這部影片我就不會在目前所在的地方重拍一次，因為拍完後我就不敢再去巴黎的“花神咖啡館”（Café de Flore）了，我會覺得很不好意思。是的，我是真的這麼想，我已花了十五、二十年的時間去想這件事了。
我們不能說當普雷明格（Otto Preminger）在拍《胭脂虎新傳》（Carmen Jones）時曾考慮到觀衆的反應，這麼說是毫無意義的；他不是……假如他是制片的話，或許他會考慮到票房問題，他會想到音樂……這些就是他會想到的。能夠想到上述種種問題就已經是他的優點了，再加上他本身一點才華，這些就是他赢别人的地方。
我們生活在群體中，不能不與别人來往溝通。這是一個金錢挂帥的世界，人們常受制于金錢因素，被迫去執行上級的命令。結果到了最後，遇有不幸事故發生時，大家便去審判上司主管……實在太不可思議了！例如，那些下令開槍的将領，戰後往往被當成戰犯來審判。問題是，他隻說那麼寥寥一句話而已，一句話沒啥危險的。相反地，那些成千上萬的士兵，他們卻去執行命令（同時也是執刑）……他們在執行命令之時隻是在服從上級的話而已。到底大家在保護什麼？大家在保護“服從”這件事。下達命令的人有罪，服從命令的人卻沒罪，這一點實在很危險，“服從”制度一旦未被質疑，戰争災禍就永無止息。
以電影來說，例如一名工會幹部在拍攝一名國家元首，爾後又抱怨說國家元首給他的薪資太低，但是他還是一直拍下去，繼續從事本行。他怎麼能夠如此混下去呢？我們是不能以中立立場來拍攝，非得表明立場才行。我們不能很天真地去拍智利強人皮諾切特（Pinochet），但至少我們有拒絕拍攝的自由。
戈達爾跑題不斷，但如果以表達（express）和印象（impress）之關系為線索來統合他的絮叨，還是容易做到的。戈達爾是一位不滿足于僅僅給觀衆以印象的人，為了實現“表達”，他不斷試驗自己新的電影語言。然而，當他嘗試地越多，他便越深刻地體驗到交流的困難、蒼白和虛妄。他接受了這種不完整性，也有可能是以一種遊戲的心态用這種發現來回頭懷疑審視自己的“雄心壯志”，總之他開始用更有趣的方式去揭示這種不完整性：在《随心所欲》裡，是通過一層層地剝去外在卻将靈魂視作一個謎，是通過直接與哲學教授談論語言與思想的關系問題，通過聲畫的分離重組，通過笨拙滑稽的台詞。 Godard’s Vivre Sa Vie Susan Sontag
PREFACE: Vivre Sa Vie invites a rather theoretical treatment, because it is—intellectually, aesthetically—extremely complex. Godard’s films are about ideas, in the best, purest, most sophisticated sense in which a work of art can be “about” ideas. I have discovered, while writing these notes, that in an interview in the Paris weekly, L’Express, July 27, 1961, he said: “My three films all have, at bottom, the same subject. I take an individual who has an idea, and who tries to go to the end of his idea.” Godard said this after he had made, besides a number of short films, A Bout de Souffle (1959) with Jean Seberg and Jean-Paul Belmondo, Le Petit Soldat (1960) with Michel Subor and Anna Karina, and Une Femme est Une Femme (1961) with Karina, Belmondo, and Jean-Claude Brialy. How this is true of Vivre Sa Vie, his fourth film, which he made in 1962, is what I have attempted to show.
NOTE: Godard, who was born in Paris in 1930, has now completed ten feature films. After the four mentioned above, he made Les Carabiniers (1962-63) with Marino Mase and Albert Juross, Le Mépris (1963) with Brigitte Bardot, Jack Palance, and Fritz Lang, Bande à Part (1964) with Karina, Sami Frey, and Claude Brasseur, Une Femme Mariée (1964) with Macha Méril and Bernard Noël, Alphaville (1965) with Karina, Eddie Constantine, and Akim Tamirof , and Pierrot le Fou (1965) with Karina and Belmondo. Six of the films have been shown in America. The first called Breathless here, is by now established as an art-house classic; the eighth, The Married Woman, has had a mixed reception; but the others, under the titles A Woman Is a Woman, My Life to Live, Contempt, and Band of Outsiders, have been both critical and box-of ice flops. The brilliance of A Bout de Souffle is now obvious to everybody and I shall explain my esteem for Vivre Sa Vie. While I am not claiming that all his other work is on the same level of excellence, there is no film of Godard’s which does not have many remarkable passages of the highest quality. The obtuseness of serious critics here to the merits of Le Mépris, a deeply flawed but nonetheless extraordinarily ambitious and original film, seems to me particularly lamentable.
1
“The cinema is still a form of graphic art,” Cocteau wrote in his Journals. “Through its mediation, I write in pictures, and secure for my own ideology a power in actual fact. I show what others tell. In Orphée, for example, I do not narrate the passing through mirrors; I show it, and in some manner, I prove it. The means I use are not important, if my characters perform publicly what I want them to perform. The greatest power of a film is to be indisputable with respect to the actions it determines and which are carried out before our eyes. It is normal for the witness of an action to transform it for his own use, to distort it, and to testify to it inaccurately. But the action was carried out, and is carried out as often as the machine resurrects it. It combats inexact testimonies and false police reports.”
2
All art may be treated as a mode of proof, an assertion of accuracy in the spirit of maximum vehemence. Any work of art may be seen as an attempt to be indisputable with respect to the actions it represents.
3
Proof differs from analysis. Proof establishes that something happened. Analysis shows why it happened. Proof is a mode of argument that is, by definition, complete; but the price of its completeness is that proof is always formal. Only what is already contained in the beginning is proven at the end. In analysis, however, there are always further angles of understanding, new realms of causality. Analysis is substantive. Analysis is a mode of argument that is, by definition, always incomplete; it is, properly speaking, interminable.
The extent to which a given work of art is designed as a mode of proof is, of course, a matter of proportion. Surely, some works of art are more directed toward proof, more based on considerations of form, than others. But still, I should argue, all art tends toward the formal, toward a completeness that must be formal rather than substantive—endings that exhibit grace and design, and only secondarily convince in terms of psychological motives or social forces. (Think of the barely credible but immensely satisfying endings of most of Shakespeare’s plays, particularly the comedies.) In great art, it is form—or, as I call it here, the desire to prove rather than the desire to analyze—that is ultimately sovereign. It is form that allows one to terminate.
4
An art concerned with proof is formal in two senses. Its subject is the form (above and beyond the matter) of events, and the forms (above and beyond the matter) of consciousness. Its means are formal; that is, they include a conspicuous element of design (symmetry, repetition, inversion, doubling, etc.). This can be true even when the work is so laden with “content” that it virtually proclaims itself as didactic—like Dante’s Divine Comedy.
5（按：為什麼說戈達爾拍的不是一般的社會批判電影？在12組片段的序列銜接中，他抛棄了對因果性的解釋或分析。）
Godard’s films are particularly directed toward proof, rather than analysis. Vivre Sa Vie is an exhibit, a demonstration. It shows that something happened, not why it happened. It exposes the inexorability of an event.
For this reason, despite appearances, Godard’s films are drastically untopical. An art concerned with social, topical issues can never simply show that something is. It must indicate how. It must show why. But the whole point of Vivre Sa Vie is that it does not explain anything. It rejects causality. (Thus, the ordinary causal sequence of narrative is broken in Godard’s film by the extremely arbitrary decomposition of the story into twelve episodes—episodes which are serially, rather than causally, related.) Vivre Sa Vie is certainly not “about” prostitution, any more than Le Petit Soldat is “about” the Algerian War. Neither does Godard in Vivre Sa Vie give us any explanation, of an ordinary recognizable sort, as to what led the principal character, Nana, ever to become a prostitute. Is it because she couldn’t borrow 2,000 francs toward her back rent from her former husband or from one of her fellow clerks at the record store in which she works and was locked out of her apartment? Hardly that. At least, not that alone. But we scarcely know any more than this. All Godard shows us is that she did become a prostitute. Again, Godard does not show us why, at the end of the film, Nana’s pimp Raoul “sells” her, or what has happened between them, or what lies behind the final gun battle in the street in which Nana is killed. He only shows us that she is sold, that she does die. He does not analyze. He proves.
6
Godard uses two means of proof in Vivre Sa Vie. He gives us a collection of images illustrating what he wants to prove, and a series of “texts” e3xplaining it. In keeping the two elements separate, Godard’s film employs a genuinely novel means of exposition.
7（按：戈達爾所要展示和證實的，不是魔幻何以為真，而是洞察力與思維何以接近假、是對它們的解構，為此，他使用了斷續和分離的技術與風格）
Godard’s intention is Cocteau’s. But Godard discerns difficulties, where Cocteau saw none. What Cocteau wanted to show, to be indisputable with reference to, was magic—things like the reality of fascination, the eternal possibility of metamorphosis. (Passing through mirrors, etc.) What Godard wishes to show is the opposite: the anti-magical, the structure of lucidity. This is why Cocteau used techniques that, by means of the alikeness of images, bind together events—to form a total sensuous whole. Godard makes no effort to exploit the beautiful in this sense. He uses techniques that would fragment, dissociate, alienate, break up. Example: the famous staccato editing (jump cuts et al.) in A Bout de Souf le. Another example: the division of Vivre Sa Vie into twelve episodes, with long titles like chapter headings at the beginning of each episode, telling us more or less what is going to happen.
The rhythm of Vivre Sa Vie is stopping-and-starting. (In another style, this is also the rhythm of Le Mépris.) Hence, Vivre Sa Vie is divided into separate episodes. Hence, too, the repeated halting and resuming of the music in the credit sequence; and the abrupt presentation of Nana’s face—first in left profile, then (without transition) full face, then (again without transition) in right profile. But, above all, there is the dissociation of word and image which runs through the entire film, permitting quite separate accumulations of intensity for both idea and feeling.
8
Throughout the history of film, image and word have worked in tandem. In the silent film, the word— set down in the form of titles—alternated with, literally linked together, the sequences of images. With the advent of sound films, image and word became simultaneous rather than successive. While in silent films the word could be either comment on the action or dialogue by the participants in the action, in sound films the word became (except for documentaries) almost exclusively, certainly preponderantly dialogue.
Godard restores the dissociation of word and image characteristic of silent film, but on a new level. Vivre Sa Vie is clearly composed of two discrete types of material, the seen and the heard. But in the distinguishing of these materials, Godard is very ingenious, even playful. One variant is the television documentary or cinéma-vérité style of Episode VIII—while one is taken, first, on a car ride through Paris, then sees, in rapid montage, shots of a dozen clients, one hears a dry flat voice rapidly detailing the routine, hazards, and appalling arduousness of the prostitute’s vocation. Another variant is in Episode XII, where the happy banalities exchanged by Nana and her young lover are projected on the screen in the form of subtitles. The speech of love is not heard at all.
9（按：如果文本已經講述了故事，那麼圖像就不必負此重擔。文本标識了理性，圖像召喚觀衆的情感。而分離之後，這種召喚作用使圖像成為反思的工具，可以自由地選取重點，可以情感中立與文本形成反差，亦可以激烈地渲染情感彷佛文本所說已成注定。《随心所欲》将先聽後看，先展示文獻後拍攝的手法推到了極緻）
Thus, Vivre Sa Vie must be seen as an extension of a particular cinematic genre: the narrated film. There are two standard forms of this genre, which give us images plus a text. In one, an impersonal voice, the author, as it were, narrates the film. In the other, we hear the interior monologue of the main character, narrating the events as we see them happening to him.
Two examples of the first type, featuring an anonymous commenting voice which oversees the action, are Resnais’ L’Année Dernière à Marienbad and Melville’s Les Enfants Terribles. An example of the second type, featuring an interior monologue of the main character, is Franju’s Thérèse Desqueyroux. Probably the greatest examples of the second type, in which the entire action is recited by the hero, are Bresson’s Le Journal d’un Curé de Campagne and Un Condamné à Mort s’est Échappé.
Godard used the technique brought to perfection by Bresson in his second film, Le Petit Soldat, made in 1960 in Geneva though not released (because for three years it was banned by the French censors) until January 1963. The film is the sequence of the reflections of the hero, Bruno Forestier, a man embroiled in a right-wing terrorist organization who is assigned the job of killing a Swiss agent for the FLN. As the film opens, one hears Forestier’s voice saying: “The time for action is passed. I have grown older. The time for reflection has come.” Bruno is a photographer. He says, “To photograph a face is to photograph the soul behind it. Photography is truth. And the cinema is the truth twenty-four times a second.” This central passage in Le Petit Soldat, in which Bruno meditates on the relation between the image and truth, anticipates the complex meditation on the relation between language and truth in Vivre Sa Vie.
Since the story itself in Le Petit Soldat, the factual connections between the characters, are mostly conveyed through Forestier’s monologue, Godard’s camera is freed to become an instrument of contemplation—of certain aspects of events, and of characters. Quiet “events”—Karina’s face, the façade of buildings, passing through the city by car—are studied by the camera, in a way that somewhat isolates the violent action. The images seem arbitrary sometimes, expressing a kind of emotional neutrality; at other times, they indicate an intense involvement. It is as though Godard hears, then looks at what he hears.
In Vivre Sa Vie, Godard takes this technique of hearing first, then seeing, to new levels of complexity. There is no longer a single unified point of view, either the protagonist’s voice (as in Le Petit Soldat) or a godlike narrator, but a series of documents (texts, narrations, quotations, excerpts, set pieces) of various description. These are primarily words; but they may also be worldless sounds, or even wordless images.
10
All the essentials of Godard’s technique are present in the opening credit sequence and in the first episode. The credits occur over a left profile view of Nana, so dark that it is almost a silhouette. (The title of the film is Vivre Sa Vie. A Film in Twelve Episodes. ) As the credits continue, she is shown full face, and then from the right side, still in deep shadow. Occasionally she blinks or shifts her head slightly (as if it were uncomfortable to hold still so long), or wets her lips. Nana is posing. She is being seen.
Next we are given the first titles. “Episode I: Nana and Paul. Nana Feels Like Giving Up.” Then the images begin, but the emphasis is on what is heard. The film proper opens in the midst of a conversation between Nana and a man; they are seated at the counter of a café; their backs are to the camera; besides their conversation, we hear the noises of the barman, and snatches of the voices of other customers. As they talk, always facing away from the camera, we learn that the man (Paul) is Nana’s husband, that they have a child, and that she has recently left both husband and child to try to become an actress. In this brief public reunion (it is never clear on whose initiative it came about) Paul is stiff and hostile, but wants her to come back; Nana is oppressed, desperate, and revolted by him. After weary, bitter words, Nana says to Paul, “The more you talk, the less it means.” Throughout this opening sequence, Godard systematically deprives the viewer. There is no cross-cutting. The viewer is not allowed to see, to become involved. He is only allowed to hear.
Only after Nana and Paul break off their fruitless conversation to leave the counter and play a game at the pinball machine, do we see them. Even here, the emphasis remains on hearing. As they go on talking, we continue to see Nana and Paul mainly from behind. Paul has stopped pleading and being rancorous. He tells Nana of the droll theme his father, a schoolteacher, received from one of his pupils on an assigned topic, The Chicken. “The chicken has an inside and an outside,” wrote the little girl. “Remove the outside and you find the inside. Remove the inside, and you find the soul.” On these words, the image dissolves and the episode ends.
11
The story of the chicken is the first of many “texts” in the film which establish what Godard wants to say. For the story of the chicken, of course, is the story of Nana. (There is a pun in French—the French poule being something like, but a good deal rougher than, the American “chick.”) In Vivre Sa Vie, we witness the stripping down of Nana. The film opens with Nana having divested herself of her outside: her old identity. Her new identity, within a few episodes, is to be that of a prostitute. But Godard’s interest is in neither the psychology nor the sociology of prostitution. He takes up prostitution as the most radical metaphor for the separating out of the elements of a life—as a testing ground, a crucible for the study of what is essential and what is superfluous in a life.
12
The whole of Vivre Sa Vie may be seen as a text. It is a text in, a study of, lucidity; it is about seriousness.
And it “uses” texts (in the more literal sense), in all but two of its twelve episodes. The little girl’s essay on the chicken told by Paul in Episode I. The passage from the pulp magazine story recited by the salesgirl in Episode II. (“You exaggerate the importance of logic.”) The excerpt from Dreyer’s Jeanne d’Arc which Nana watches in Episode III. The story of the theft of 1,000 francs which Nana relates to the police inspector in Episode IV. (We learn that her full name is Nana Klein and that she was born in 1940.) Yvette’s story—how she was abandoned by Raymond two years ago —and Nana’s speech in reply (“I am responsible”) in Episode VI. The letter of application Nana composes to the madam of a brothel in Episode VII. The documentary narration of the life and routine of the prostitute in Episode VIII. The record of dance music in Episode IX. The conversation with the philosopher in Episode XI. The excerpt from the story by Edgar Allan Poe (“The Oval Portrait”) read aloud by Luigi in Episode XII.
13
The most elaborate, intellectually, of all the texts in the film is the conversation in Episode XI between Nana and a philosopher (played by the philosopher, Brice Parain) in a café. They discuss the nature of language. Nana asks why one can’t live without words; Parain explains that it is because talking equals thinking, and thinking talking, and there is no life without thought. It is not a question of speaking or not speaking, but of speaking well. Speaking well demands an ascetic discipline (une ascèse), detachment. One has to understand, for one thing, that there is no going straight at the truth. One needs error.
Early in their conversation, Parain relates the story of Dumas’ Porthos, the man of action, whose first thought killed him. (Running away from a dynamite charge he had planted, Porthos suddenly wondered how one could walk, how anyone ever placed one foot in front of the other. He stopped. The dynamite exploded. He was killed.) There is a sense in which this story, too, like the story of the chicken, is about Nana. And through both the story and the Poe tale told in the next (and last) episode, we are being prepared—formally, not substantively—for Nana’s death.
14（按：難解的一段話。但至少我們可以汲取到如下觀點：第一，妓女是對“把自己借給别人；把自己留給自己”的極端隐喻，Nana當然給自己留了一個令人驚異的用來支撐的思想世界，但究竟留了些什麼呢？戈達爾沒有從正面去描述心理活動和情感狀态，我們隻能去推測。第二，《随心所欲》描繪了一個對自由理解逐漸深入的過程，Nana從一開始的絕望、“希望自己是别人”，到成為妓女後的“我自己負責”——因為我們知道，自由就是對責任的确認，是認識到事物就是其本身之所是并接受這一點。）
Godard takes his motto for this film-essay on freedom and responsibility from Montaigne: “Lend yourself to others; give yourself to yourself.” The life of the prostitute is, of course, the most radical metaphor for the act of lending oneself to others. But if we ask, how has Godard shown us Nana keeping herself for herself, the answer is: he has not shown it. He has, rather, expounded on it. We don’t know Nana’s motives except at a distance, by inference. The film eschews all psychology; there is no probing of states of feeling, of inner anguish.
Nana knows herself to be free, Godard tells us. But that freedom has no psychological interior. Freedom is not an inner, psychological something—but more like physical grace. It is being what, who one is. In Episode I, Nana says to Paul, “I want to die.” In Episode II, we see her desperately trying to borrow money, trying unsuccessfully to force her way past the concierge and get into her own apartment. In Episode III, we see her weeping in the cinema over Jeanne d’Arc. In Episode IV, at the police station, she weeps again as she relates the humiliating incident of the theft of 1,000 francs. “I wish I were someone else,” she says. But in Episode V (“On the Street. The First Client”) Nana has become what she is. She has entered the road that leads to her affirmation and to her death. Only as prostitute do we see a Nana who can affirm herself. This is the meaning of Nana’s speech to her fellow prostitute Yvette in Episode VI, in which she declares serenely, “I am responsible. I turn my head, I am responsible. I lift my hand, I am responsible.”
Being free means being responsible. One is free, and therefore responsible, when one realizes that things are as they are. Thus, the speech to Yvette ends with the words: “A plate is a plate. A man is a man. Life is … life.”
15（按：與《貞德》的互文。Nana的生活具有一種殉道的性質，因為同貞德一樣，她的快樂并不“有趣”，而且她們最後都在種種對必然性的暗示中“真的死了”。然而，這裡又有兩種殉道之分，一種是直抒胸臆的、相信宗教和相信靈魂永恒的；一種是像影子一樣，将靈魂藏在内在之下、不敢評論而小心守護的）
That freedom has no psychological interior—that the soul is something to be found not upon but after stripping away the “inside” of a person—is the radical spiritual doctrine which Vivre Sa Vie illustrates.
One would guess that Godard is quite aware of the difference between his sense of the “soul” and the traditional Christian one. The difference is precisely underscored by the quotation from Dreyer’s Jeanne d’Arc; for the scene which we see is the one in which the young priest (played by Antonin Artaud) comes to tell Jeanne (Mlle Falconetti) that she is to be burned at the stake. Her martyrdom, Jeanne assures the distraught priest, is really her deliverance. While the choice of a quotation from a film does distance our emotional involvement with these ideas and feelings, the reference to martyrdom is not ironic in this context. Prostitution, as Vivre Sa Vie allows us to see it, has entirely the character of an ordeal. “Pleasure isn’t all fun,” as the title to Episode X announces laconically. And Nana does die.
The twelve episodes of Vivre Sa Vie are Nana’s twelve stations of the cross. But in Godard’s film the values of sanctity and martyrdom are transposed to a totally secular plane. Godard offers us Montaigne instead of Pascal, something akin to the mood and intensity of Bressonian spirituality but without Catholicism.
16
The one false step in Vivre Sa Vie comes at the end, when Godard breaks the unity of his film by referring to it from the outside, as maker. Episode XII begins with Nana and Luigi in a room together; he is a young man with whom she has apparently fallen in love (we have seen him once before, in Episode IX, when Nana meets him in a billiard parlor and flirts with him). At first the scene is silent, and the dialogue—“Shall we go out?” “Why don’t you move in with me?” etc.—rendered in subtitles. Then Luigi, lying on the bed, begins to read aloud from Poe’s “The Oval Portrait,” a story about an artist engaged in painting a portrait of his wife; he strives for the perfect likeness, but at the moment he finally achieves it his wife dies. The scene fades out on these words, and opens to show Raoul, Nana’s pimp, roughly forcing her through the courtyard of her apartment house, pushing her into a car. After a car ride (one or two brief images), Raoul hands Nana over to another pimp; but it is discovered that the money exchanged is not enough, guns are drawn, Nana is shot, and the last image shows the cars speeding away and Nana lying dead in the street.
What is objectionable here is not the abruptness of the ending. It is the fact that Godard is clearly making a reference outside the film, to the fact that the young actress who plays Nana, Anna Karina, is his wife. He is mocking his own tale, which is unforgivable. It amounts to a peculiar failure of nerve, as if Godard did not dare to let us have Nana’s death—in all its horrifying arbitrariness—but had to provide, at the last moment, a kind of subliminal causality. (The woman is my wife.—The artist who portrays his wife kills her.—Nana must die.)
17
This one lapse aside, Vivre Sa Vie seems to me a perfect film. That is, it sets out to do something that is both noble and intricate, and wholly succeeds in doing it. Godard is perhaps the only director today who is interested in “philosophical films” and possessses an intelligence and discretion equal to the task. Other directors have had their “views” on contemporary society and the nature of our humanity; and sometimes their films survive the ideas they propose. Godard is the first director fully to grasp the fact that, in order to deal seriously with ideas, one must create a new film language for expressing them—if the ideas are to have any suppleness and complexity. This he has been trying to do in different ways: in Le Petit Soldat, Vivre Sa Vie, Les Carabiniers, Le Mépris, Une Femme Mariée, and Alphaville—Vivre Sa Vie being, I think, his most successful film. For this conception, and the formidable body of work in which he has pursued it, Godard is in my opinion the most important director to have emerged in the last ten years.
