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自私的混蛋: 阿特拉斯耸耸肩,第一部分

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我看见 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 星期六,16 月 XNUMX 日。 在一个以白人为主的地区,这是一场面向全白人观众的演出,售罄。 观众中有一大群茶党人士,主要是基督徒,以及自由主义者和客观主义者。

当我们等待电影开始时,有令人讨厌的反政府玩笑。 电影结束后掌声雷动,但我没有加入。事实上,我发现这是一部非常令人失望的改编安兰德史诗小说的前三分之一,关于理性在人类生存中的作用以及如果理性而富有成效的人——将世界扛在肩上的阿特拉斯——将摆脱他们的负担,继续罢工。

阿特拉斯耸耸肩可能是一部壮观的电影。 这无疑是一部引人入胜的小说,虽然不是一部完美的小说,主要是因为它被高尔特演讲的怪诞过度所扭曲,小说的主人公约翰·高尔特在 60 多页中解释了兰德的客观主义哲学。 但我必须把它交给兰德,因为至少对我来说,她甚至设法让高尔特的演讲成为翻页者。 事实上,虽然我拒绝兰德的个人主义和资本主义,并且不会在她面前持续五分钟, 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 是我读过的最大胆、最引人入胜的小说之一——而且我读过大部分经典作品——甚至它也比不上兰德早期的小说 源头. 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 是最伟大的悬疑小说,因为它讲述了文明兴衰的原因。 这是最伟大的冒险,因为它讲述了一个人停止世界的故事。

尽管兰德从哲学角度反对种族民族主义(当然,犹太复国主义在情感上是个例外),但她的小说对于种族民族主义者来说仍然很有价值。 兰德最初是一位尼采主义者,她的小说有力地捍卫了贵族,并批判了平等主义、民主、大众和大众社会。 所有这些元素都与她后来的理性、个人主义和资本主义哲学相矛盾。 事实上,兰德觉得有必要重新构建、修改或简单地压制她早期的、更多尼采式的著作。 但她小说的“生命感”与法西斯精神如此吻合,以至于她的第一部小说 我们生活 被拍成墨索里尼的电影,兰德后来用高大的故事和小说的修订版混淆了这一事实。 (意大利人 我们生活顺便说一句,它仍然是兰德小说改编的唯一一部好的电影。)

托马斯·哈特·本顿,《今日美国的钢铁》,1930
托马斯·哈特·本顿,《今日美国的钢铁》,1930

源头 可以与利润一起阅读 批判文化,因为它有效地戏剧化了犹太人颠覆美国社会的技巧。 兰德的反派埃尔斯沃思·图赫(Ellsworth Toohey)将他的游戏总结为玩精神的股票市场——卖空,这意味着从我们价值观的下降中获利,这几乎概括了美国犹太人在一股淫秽、颓废、堕落、游说、诈骗、流行文化和赌场资本主义。

当然,兰德从来没有这样看,而兰德自己的运动客观主义与法兰克福学派一样是一场犹太知识分子运动,虽然他们使用非常不同的论点,但它们的作用是产生相同的结果:一种激进的个人主义,像犹太人这样的有凝聚力的族群对大多数人来说是不可见的,这最大限度地提高了他们的集体安全和向上流动性,因为有凝聚力的集体在与孤立的个人竞争时具有系统优势。 (兰德称她的运动中以犹太人为主的核心圈子为“集体”。这应该是一个笑话,但这个笑话可能比大多数人想象的要深刻。)

Tamara de Lempicka,“自动肖像”
Tamara de Lempicka,“自动肖像”

阿特拉斯耸耸肩,此外,它还适用于种族解释。 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 是关于一个富有创造力和生产力的少数人如何被少数人剥削,因为他们接受了一种虚假的道德准则(利他主义),这种道德准则美化了弱者,并将强者的价值与他们为下级服务的程度挂钩。 当有人问“阿特拉斯的种族是什么?” 这一切都到位了。 维护现代世界的阿特拉斯是白人种族,他们因接受错误的道德准则(种族利他主义)而被奴役和摧毁,该准则教导非白人仅因为白人的邪恶而无法达到白人标准,而白人只能通过将他们的财富、权力和社会给予非白人来弥补这种种族内疚。

利他主义归根结底是虚无主义,因为当下级最终削弱并摧毁了上级时,他们也会灭亡。 但这样的后果对蝗虫、寄生虫和被错误价值观控制的人并不重要。 唯一能拯救我们所有人的是一场道德革命,一种新形式的利己主义,尽管我在这场革命的性质上与兰德分道扬镳,因为她是个人主义者,而我是种族集体主义者。 兰德认为个人比群体更重要,这就是你对一个主要生活在她脑海中的没有孩子的女人所期望的。

兰德的美学是深刻的法西斯主义——和社会主义现实主义——强调人类通过科学、技术和工业对自然的英勇改造。 兰德也喜欢北欧人。 她所有的英雄都是高大瘦削的北欧人。 兰德,出生于艾丽莎·罗森鲍姆,不是。

爱德华·霍珀,“C 舱,293 号车”,1938 年
爱德华·霍珀,“C 舱,293 号车”,1938 年

阿特拉斯耸耸肩 电影演员阵容很差。 就长相而言,最好的选择是泰勒席林饰演达格尼塔格特,格兰特鲍勒饰演汉克里尔登,丽贝卡威索基饰演莉莲雷登。 约翰波利托,意大利黑帮 米勒的穿越(“这是关于道德的……”),对 Orren Boyle 来说是一个不错的选择。 Michael Lerner 看起来很适合 Wesley Mouch 的角色,但他的个性有点太强势了。 马修·马斯登饰演詹姆斯·塔格特的角色太帅了,但他把它变成了自己的角色。

最糟糕的选择是黑人演员 Edi Gathegi,为北欧的 Eddie Willers 电影)和 Jsu Garcia(他们买不起一个完整的耶稣吗?),他看起来像一个放荡的混血儿,为卡斯蒂利亚弗朗西斯科·德安科尼亚的蓝眼睛后裔。 扮演休·阿克斯顿和罗伯特·斯塔德勒博士的演员对于他们的角色来说都太年轻了,而斯塔德勒看起来像中东人,说话带着浓重的口音!

As for the acting, it is pretty much undistinguished throughout: strictly soap opera grade. The best-realized roles are James Taggart and Lillian Rearden. Eddie Willers is an embarrassment. A wooden Indian would have been just as expressive and — more importantly from the producers’ point of view — even cheaper and just as politically correct. Or is there a message in casting a black man to play a character who is essentially a faithful mediocre sidekick?

Thomas Hart Benton, “Coal,” 1930
Thomas Hart Benton, “Coal,” 1930

As for the script, it is shockingly pedestrian. Rand gives us an abundance of eloquent dialogue, but almost none of it is used. It soon becomes apparent why: whenever a bit of it slips in, the actors sound as wooden as Gary Cooper in King Vidor’s 1949 movie of 源头, meaning that they don’t have the brains to understand the dialogue or the skill to sell it. Rand’s dialogue is not naturalistic, but if an actor can sell Shakespeare, he can sell Ayn Rand. Tolkein’s dialogue is certainly not naturalistic, but it was faithfully adapted and beautifully delivered in Peter Jackson’s 指环王 三部曲。

But given a cast of blockheads and Brooks Brothers models who read from teleprompters, we could not have Francisco d’Anconia’s money speech. We could only have colloquial naturalism with vulgarities like “crap” and “bullshit” thrown in. I suppose we should be grateful that we were not told that Galt’s motor was “awesome” and the Equalization of Opportunity Act “sucked.” (I wonder if the script contained emoticons. Maybe the performances would have been improved.)

Tamara de Lempicka, Portrait of Madame Allan Bott
塔玛拉·德·伦皮卡,
Portrait of Madame Allan Bott

The whole look of this movie is wrong. Visually it is astonishingly flat, dull, and unimaginative. Rand’s novel requires a 巴西 look: Art Deco in a vague “future”: hair and wardrobe by Tamara de Lempicka, interiors by Edward Hopper, industrial scenes from Thomas Hart Benton, casting by Arno Breker (although the men would need to be less beefy), sets by Frank Lloyd Wright, all directed by Leni Riefenstahl. Of course that would have cost money, but the real poverty in this film is of imagination and taste. Instead, we get a film set in the near future (2016 and 2017) that feels the need to explain the prominence of rail transport with an energy crisis.

The greatest aesthetic flaw of this film is the contrasting treatment of nature and industry. A film of 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 should glorify and aestheticize human achievement, especially heavy industry, and there is plenty of fascist, National Socialist, Socialist Realist, and New Deal art that they could have drawn upon to do this (but of course that would be “politically incorrect” from an Objectivist point of view). But instead, we have only pedestrian low angle shots of rail yards full of box cars — which might actually have been visually captivating if simply viewed from the air. The scenes of the Readen factory and the building of the John Galt Line offered many opportunities for visual splendor and dynamism, but they too are pedestrian at best. The best sequence is the first run of the John Galt Line, one of Ayn Rand’s most brilliant feats of description. (This was the only scene in which I even noticed the music.) But even here the movie pales by comparison to the printed page. I was left wondering: Did the director even 这本书?

Edward Hopper, “New York Office,” 1962
Edward Hopper, “New York Office,” 1962

The inept handling of industry is underscored by the intrusion of nature photography. Ayn Rand looked at nature as merely the raw material and backdrop of human achievement. But in the movie of 阿特拉斯耸耸肩, the most beautiful scenes are of mountains and prairies. During the first run of the John Galt line, Dagny Taggart and Hank Readen’s achievements are dwarfed by the beauty of the landscape. The focus should have been on the train, the rails, the rising throb of the engines, the telephone poles rushing by faster and faster, as a vast, streamlined art deco engine shot like a bullet toward the gossamer arc of the great bridge of Rearden metal. The spectacular Rocky Mountain landscape and sky should have been hidden by a drop-cloth of clouds, fog, and rain.

The treatment of sex in this film is also objectionable. When Lillian Rearden asks her husband “Through are you?” as he rolls off her, there was a gasp in the theater. (James Kirkpatrick reported the same thing in his brilliant 检讨 at 替代权.) Talking to Tea Partiers afterward, I discovered that the gasp was due to their strongly Christian orientation. Apparently it struck them not as vicious and condescending, but simply as pretty racy stuff. Later, when Hank Rearden began his affair with Dagny Taggart, there was a less audible but still real reaction in the audience, for the same reason. The only real criticism the Christian Tea Partiers had was that the movie portrayed an extramarital affair in a positive light.

The affair is, by the way, significantly altered from the book. In the book Hank Rearden is profoundly conflicted about his attraction to Dagny, which he attributes to mere animal lust which tempts him to violate his wedding vows, which he treats as a matter of honor, even though his marriage is a loveless hell. When he finally gives in to temptation, it is one of Ayn Rand’s famous “rape” scenes. In the movie, after the running of the John Galt Line, Rearden in effect says, “Here we are, at the moment of our greatest triumph, and all I want to do is kiss you.” Dagny coyly replies, “Why don’t you then?” Cut to a tender lovemaking montage. (I could not help but think of Rand’s own parody “Sorry baby, I can’t take you to the pizza joint tonight, I have to go back to the science lab and split the atom.”) Is moral conflict and rough, passionate sex just too politically incorrect these days? Again, what were the filmmakers thinking?

为何 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 made on the cheap? Apparently the producers could not come up with a script or a concept good enough to raise the money and attract the talent to do a first rate movie, and since their option was expiring, they decided to do a second rate movie instead (and managed to pull off a fourth rate one). This level of cynicism is frankly breath-taking. One has to ask: Is this how Howard Roark would have made a movie? (If this film accomplishes one thing, it will make us appreciate the 1949 movie of 源头 more.)

Tamara de Lempicka, “Tadeusz de Lempicka,” 1928
塔玛拉·德·伦皮卡,
“Tadeusz de Lempicka,” 1928

From now on this should be referred to as director Paul Johansson’s 阿特拉斯耸耸肩, for it is Ayn Rand’s 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 in name only. (Johansson turns out to be every bit the director that one would expect of a soap opera hunk.) It is merely an exercise in masochism to wonder how a visionary director of epics like Zack Snyder or Peter Jackson or Oliver Stone would have brought 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 to the screen, because we will never know. Vidor’s 源头 was bad enough that more than 60 years later, we are still without a decent film of one of the greatest American novels of the 20th-century. Which means that there will never be a decent movie of 阿特拉斯耸耸肩 in my lifetime, thanks to the selfish mediocre bastards behind this cinematic abortion.

(从重新发布 逆流出版 经作者或代表的许可)
 
• 类别: 艺术/信件 •标签: 电影 
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