典当商

On Miss Birchfield’s terrace, our somber, reserved hero Sol Nazerman bitterly uttered his ‘long lost’ experience: ‘It’s been a long time since I felt ... fear. ... There have been memories that I have ... Well, I thought that I had pushed them far away from me, and they keep rushing in. And then there are words that I thought that I have kept myself from hearing and … now they flood my mind.’ Indeed, the fear that overwhelms Sol is generated from his memories. And memory introduces two key issues in this film, that is, how does one live with traumatic memories that he intentionally tried to ‘push away’ and in what ways can the art of filmmaking approach them.

As for the first question, one may answer with the role played by memory in Sol’s ‘dead’ life: in fact, this debilitated character, who keeps himself remote from everyone, solely has his dire memories as company. In the terrace conversation, he refuses Miss Birchfield’s sympathy of him ‘being alone’ with a sneer – for Sol, the problem is not loneliness (we may also recall her naïve comparison between her loss of husband and Sol’s experience in the camp), but the memories that kept haunting him and depriving him of serenity. Despite Tessie’s father’s furious accusation of being a ‘walking dead’, Sol cannot, if we quote Rodriguez in a later scene in the film, ‘die when (he) want(s) it so badly’. Memory is a phantom lives in his body, dominating his pawnbroker life all the time. Thus, we may say that, although related to the old times, memory, per se, is not a series of events that happened in the past. It is what grabs you and parasitizes you as you walk down the journey of life.

So, how does one live with memories that they try to eliminate but keep flooding back? The answer is, he takes them as fragments that randomly interrupt his semi-conscious mind. And here comes the answer to our second question: Lumet’s splendid montage is the key to represent such kind of memory. Take the scene when the prostitute strips at the pawnshop for example. When she first mentions the name of Rodriguez, a picture of a Nazi officer is cut in twice, extremely briefly. And then a static picture of his wife cuts in, also very briefly. The pictures disappear so quickly that the audience almost cannot figure out what it really is – some may not even notice it. Then, as she strips with her suggestive line ‘Look’, we begin to catch the full picture of Sol’s dreadful memory of seeing his wife being forced into prostitution. And this is exactly how such kind of memories intrudes our real life. At first, it comes to you almost randomly and briefly, so brief that you might not even notice it. You only sense, something is there. And this tiny fragment works like a pebble drops into the deep lake of your mind. As it sinks, a dimple hundreds times bigger than the pebble itself expands in the surface - the brief fragments eventually recall a huge picture which overlays your current life. And the disturbing truth is, once the pebble drops, you can no longer protect your lake from forming the toxic dimple.

Apart from the brilliant montage that reveals the myth of how memories work, the usage of black and white pictures also contributes to enhance the effect of memories. On the one hand, as in Schindler’s List, the black and white in The Pawnbroker also works to express hopelessness, bitterness and solemnness. But unlike the much more reassuring colored candle used as a symbol of hope in Schindler’s List, The Pawnbroker’s usage of complete black and white places a much harsher reality: 20 years after the WW II, survivors cannot see any hope. This change, by the way, is also a very interesting topic concerning the possibilities of making art out of the Holocaust. On the other hand, if we see black and white as a widely used method in filmmaking to illustrate things happen in the past, we discover an intention to eliminate the boundary between the past and the present. The memories of old days before the Camp are colorless because they make the tragedy even tougher. Days in the Camp are reasonably black and white whereas the current life cannot be colorful because memories from the past are always there, depriving any possible colors. Also, while Lumet used sharp contrast of black and white to present different places and mental status, in most cases the two colors mixes into an undistinguishable grey, a color that best summarizes the state of Sol’s mind – indifferent, inescapable and desperate. Though one may argue that on seeing the death of Jesus, Sol starts to ‘sense the shame of his detachment’ (the flashbacks of faces before he slams his hand down on a paper spike can be an evidence), we have to be aware of the fact that Sol is actually going through another cycle of picking up horrible memories and carrying them downwards.

        鑒于確實沒有好好讀過書也沒有好好看過阿倫雷內和羅布格里耶，因此只是看過之后閑扯幾句。
    一定是受豬影響所以才會想到都市與現代性上面。 開篇和結尾的對比：戰爭之前的田園牧歌，現代都市的"條條框框"。主人公消逝于混亂的街道人群。
    影片空間的選擇饒有趣味，閉塞，擁擠，到處都是網格。（與之對比的毫無疑問的二戰監獄的鐵絲網）
    閃回并不是電影中的新鮮手法，即便在60年代也如此。勾勒串起全篇的實際上是現實與記憶。但是不同于我印象中看過的其它影片，閃回并不是為了推進現在的敘事，恰恰相反，閃回與現在并列。相似性的并列產生類比效果，回憶中試圖逃出集中營在鐵絲網上掙扎的人與現在被毆打的年輕人；擁擠的地鐵與運送猶太人的車廂；突然闖入的德國士兵與進到典當行搶劫的年輕人等等。有趣的是，有些地方的回憶饒富力量。比如Nazerman回憶在集中營以頭撞碎玻璃的下一個鏡頭剪接的恰恰是現在的自己(如同我注視著我自己)。
    Nazerman這個家伙總讓我想起《對話》里面的Caul。一樣將自己關在一個密閉空間，躲藏在陰影處，沉默冷淡，藏著不為人知的秘密。Caul的創傷來自個體，而Nazerman來自歷史。因他是一個沒有信仰的人，戰爭奪取了他愛的一切活在無以名狀的痛苦愧疚自責當中－他沒有死，還娶了亡故朋友的妻子，他的生活圍繞著典當行以及錢。戰爭只是影片展開的背景，而它的著力點似乎并不在揭露創傷，指責暴行——我的意思并不是它沒有，而是它不僅于此。我們在影片中看到的諸多并列我認為是指涉Nzazerman所活的現在——回憶只是為了對比現在，隱喻現在生活的逼仄冷漠恐懼以及與欲望相關的所有齷齪骯臟——現在是一場沒有硝煙的戰爭。
    這場模糊了善惡的“戰爭”以年輕人Jesus的死為故事的終結，這是一個絕望的結尾。Jesus接受了Nazerman“Money is all of things”的理念而決定打劫典當行，在Nazerman告訴他你對我來說什么也不是的情況下他還是為了Nazerman飲彈而亡。
    Nazerman最后用針刺自己的舉動我以為是想獲得知覺——一直以來他都過著麻木不仁的生活。（集中營里的猶太人即像是被割斷了所有知覺）。結尾出現的那些未曾歷經戰爭的人的臉看起來疲憊憂傷，Nazerman緩慢穿行人群離開，消失在一個充滿規則，網格，條條框框的世界里。而開篇以慢鏡頭表現的草地撲蝶更像是一場久遠的不會再度想起的夢境。

     昨天看到昆德拉一句話“記憶并不是對遺忘的否定，記憶是遺忘的另一種形式”。豬在文章中提到的在retrieve和association正好可以解釋我前面提到的并列類比。
     額，似乎又在標題黨了。其實是看片的時候想到太宰治的遺言。關于生命的不可抗力。我們都活在記憶與遺忘里。記得，忘記。被記得，被忘記。

    豬關于記憶的舊文http://icebluewonder.blogbus.com/logs/1278284.html

在现代生活里，追逐金钱成为唯一解脱。追逐金钱的过程，需要摘除同情与爱。当冷酷无情开始占据上风，自我逐渐丧失，情感机能便也随之破碎。丧失自我的本我，攫取金钱的面孔，与纳粹又何异？这便是生活恐惧本源。

以为刻意麻木，便能甩开恐惧，殊不知恐惧如影随形，在生活的某个闪回空间里便会显现。现代城市生活，不过是另一辆通往集中营的列车。你去感知，它便以痛苦的方式存在；你若不觉，你只是一具可以行走的死尸。

想以死亡来了结这一切么？生活怎会如此简单便如你愿？它会在你未料的某个时刻，植入给你更大的痛苦。讽刺地，是以你最想要的死亡的方式，但那个死亡却是别人的。你需面对与担当的，仍是麻漠或恐惧。无所遁逃、无能为力。

这便是现代生活困境。