夜行客

备注：以下内容为摘译，作者Mark Harris

A suspenseless suspenser 没有任何悬念，故事完全不吸引人，我们甚至不在乎到底是谁杀的人。严重过誉的电影。但是它也有很多不俗之处。1. 人物塑造有血有肉，尤其是女性角色，极其真实，不像该类型中人物往往被放入的模子一样。2. 对该类型的反思可能是最大的价值。男主的妻子质问男主侦探算哪门子工作，这也是在对这一类型的质疑：侦探片算哪门子电影，谁他妈看侦探片，谁他妈拍侦探片。这部电影传达的最重要的信息就是侦探片已经过时了，如果还按之前的套路拍是没有出路的。巧合的是，该片与漫长的告别几乎在同一时间。两部电影都是对传统侦探片的颠覆和戏仿，但方式不同。night moves是用一种设问的方式，而漫长的告别自信地给出了答案。3. 糟糕的故事就像是对约翰D麦克唐纳对戏仿。4. 结尾不断打转的船象征了侦探片的前途，原地转圈，原地踏步，止步不前，重复自己。这是一个讽刺与悲哀兼并的结尾兼评论。受伤的侦探反映出的无力是普遍的，伤口只不过是把一种内在的本质的无力外化了。无论受伤与否，侦探永远是无力的。无论是否改变，侦探电影只能重复自己。5. 片名是一个双关语 既是night moves也是knight moves 片中男主像女主解释一盘国际象棋著名棋局中本可以仅用knights三步就把对手将死，可是那个人没想到，最后输掉了比赛。国际象棋不是第一次出现在侦探电影中，钱德勒的小说是最典型的例子，每一本书里都提到了侦探在下/看国际象棋。而night moves中的国际象棋突显了侦探的困境和这一类型的困境，虽然叫knight koves，但是与传统侦探小说不同，这部电影和骑士没有任何关系，它揭露的是一种类型的困境，而不是骑士的困境。全片最经典的台词：看侯麦的电影就像看油漆风干。

L.A. gumshoe Harry Moseby (Hackman) knows nothing, at the behest of former actress Arlene Iverson (Ward) to skip-trace her promiscuous (like mother, like daughter) jailbait daughter Delly Grastner (screen debutante Griffith), eventually he bird-dogs her in the Florida Keys, where she hangs out with her stepfather Tom Iverson (Crawford) and his girlfriend Paula (Warren), with whom Harry shares an amatory tingling. After a grisly discovery under the water during a nightly open-sea swimming, the aftershock spurs the initially reluctant Delly to change her mind and return to the City of Angels with Harry, mission accomplished without much effort, it seems. But the truth is Harry doesn’t notice the funny business right under his nose, until it is too late, a tragedy (accidental or not) brings him back to the coast to face the wrongdoers. But we cannot blame Harry, he is quite mopey recently after having inadvertently found out that he is cuckolded by his wife Ellen (Clark), yet as a private eye, he is perversely upright and scrupulous, always reveals his identity when asked, rarely resorts to violence even he is taunted by Marty Heller (Yulin), Ellen’s paramour, he doesn’t let rage go to his head, that’s what makes him a rather intriguing character that drastically differs from any prior or subsequent stereotypes of his vocation. In Arthur Penn’s NIGHT MOVES, a modern noir uncharacteristically opts for a languorous pace in de-dramatizing an old-fashion gumshoe’s banal itinerant actives, interactions (denuded of any thrills and chills until its climax) and its heavy toll. Since the entire perspective is exclusively projected from Harry’s POV, which excludes any telltale signs of ongoing criminality for a rapt audience to discern as long as Harry doesn’t discern either, actually it is not until the final reveal through the glass-bottomed boat (DP. Bruce Surtees is masterful in choosing angles from translucent barriers) , does Harry know who is behind the whole smuggling scheme and is spoiling for rubbing him out, and ironically he only survives because of his sheer luck other than any proactive heroic deeds, and the running-in-circles waterborne denouement serves as an optimal metaphor of Harry’s quagmire. Unflinchingly but candidly cynical, everyone in NIGHT MOVES has his/her self-seeking agenda behind their actions (inter alia, a wandering wife, a horrendous mother, a cocksure stunt pilot, a stroppy mechanic, a woman willing to come across with an arrière-pensée), which makes Harry, actually the least egotistic individual among the pack, and a gimlet-eyed Hackman beautifully humanizes Harry’s ordinariness without any braggadocio which is often associated with someone in his line of business. But ordinariness doesn’t necessarily mean Harry is a boring character, on the contrary, Hackman puts on an earnest front to ensure that every reaction and emotional oscillation hits the mark, plus, he is the originator of the famous aperçu about MY NIGHT AT MAUD’S (1969) ”I saw a Rohmer film once. It was kinda like watching paint dry.” Amid the supporting cast, Canadian actress Susan Clark has a daunting job to justify a neglected, unfaithful wife but she is left little in her disposal, Edward Binns is exceptionally good with his deceptive amicability, but the one who can hold it against a pyrotechnic Hackman is Jennifer Warren, a sultry beauty visibly worn down by untold secrets, with her vestigial sense of goodness pluming out in every glint of mixed emotions. The long and the short of it, for those who seeks for an old-fashioned detective story with a difference, NIGHT MOVES is simply manna from heaven. referential entries: Arthur Penn’s THE MIRACLE WORKER (1962, 8.3/10), BONNIE & CLYDE (1967, 8.6/10); Roman Polanski’s CHINATOWN (1974, 8.7/10).