Forging Artistic Identity in Swords of Old China (2008-10-9)

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Film- 'Ashes of Times' Where Wong-Kar-wai Forged His Identity in Swords of Old China
By MANOHLA DARGIS

                               
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Leslie Cheung, left, and Jacky Cheung in Wong Kar-wai’s “Ashes of Time Redux.”



There is no such thing as the end when it comes to a Wong Kar-wai film, or so it seems. Famous or notorious, depending on who’s writing the checks or spinning the spin, Mr. Wong has a long-nurtured reputation for taking his time when it comes to making movies. His romance “2046” was at least five years in the making and still unfinished when it had its scandalously delayed screening at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. His 1994 swordsman film, “Ashes of Time,” a delirious swirl of color and blinding star wattage — both Tony Leungs, Brigitte Lin, Maggie Cheung, Carina Lau and Leslie Cheung! — was two years in the making, though given Mr. Wong’s recent work on it, you could say it was closer to a 14-year labor of love.



In a world where time is money, this stubborn independence has sometimes hurt Mr. Wong’s reputation, particularly in a business in which the tick-tick-tock of the clock is measured in millions of dollars. (The industry’s grip on the discourse is never clearer than when movie critics turn into bean counters, flogging filmmakers for alleged transgressions like going over schedule.) Yet it’s understandable that Mr. Wong would stall and delay and stretch months into years because time itself — passing, elusive, cruel, vanished time — is one of his great themes. And so it is with “Ashes of Time,” which, as Mr. Wong explained at Cannes in May when he introduced the new version, was in danger of being lost to time.

More precisely, there were so many different prints in existence that Mr. Wong was inspired to make a definitive version: “Ashes of Time Redux.” In truth there is no such thing as the end for any movie, in the digital age or not, and the director’s cut is just one expression of this art’s plasticity. D. W. Griffith used to visit projection booths to snip his films already in release, which I’m sure Mr. Wong has contemplated doing on more than one occasion. Instead, in an act of aesthetic resurrection, he gathered together all the prints of “Ashes of Time” he and his team could find, shuffled and tweaked its scenes, underlined still-fuzzy relationships between characters, added some cello soul from Yo-Yo Ma, redesigned the credits and deepened the palette.

I never really understood what was going on in “Ashes of Time” when I initially saw it years ago, and it took two looks at the redo for me to parse the narrative, such as it is. (See, there’s this swordsman. ...) But transparent, forward-thrusting narrative has never been Mr. Wong’s thing; time is his thing, as are camera moves, moody lighting, shimmering color, beautiful faces and the lingering, lonely ache of romance. For Mr. Wong the graphic lines of a bird cage and the shadows that crosshatch Mr. Cheung’s face are more important than who the actor plays, though the remix makes it very clear that his character, a desert dweller called Ouyang, is a broker for itinerant swordsmen and their prospective clients.

Underloved on its release if not unnoticed (it racked up awards in Asia), the original version was overshadowed by the pop-happier “Chungking Express,” which Mr. Wong shot and completed during a several-month break from “Ashes of Time.” (Not unexpectedly, there are different explanations for this hiatus.)

With its parallel romances, cool modern surfaces and intoxicating desires, “Chungking Express” was easier on the eyes (and brain) than the elliptical, drifty “Ashes of Time,” with its Buddhist adages, flowing robes and dunes, and confusion of falling and flying bodies. But time — that word again — suggests that “Ashes” was far more important to Mr. Wong’s evolution, because it is the film during which he shook off genre and abandoned the banalities of mainstream narrative for visual abstraction, beauty, art.

                               
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A version of this article appeared in print on October 10, 2008, on page C17 of the New York edition.

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约时报:王家卫,在古代武侠中锻造艺术特色
2008年10月15日 来源：中国网


　美国《纽约时报》10月9日文章：古代武侠中锻造艺术特色（作者: MANOHLA DARGIS）

　　当说起王家卫电影时,似乎永无止尽一般。名扬四海，还是臭名昭著？这取决于谁掏腰包，或是谁做宣传。谈到制作电影，王家卫出了名地速度慢，他的浪漫电影 2046至少用了5年，直到2004年嘎纳电影节上姗姗来迟的首映,电影仍然未完成。1994年的武侠电影《东邪西毒》，狂妄的色彩与炫目的明星阵容：梁朝伟、林青霞、张曼玉、刘嘉玲和张国荣！虽然这部电影耗时2年，然而你会觉得，这看起来就想是个14岁孩子的兴趣之作。

　　在时间就是金钱的世界里，这份固执的独立有时有损于王家卫的名誉，尤其是在这样分分秒秒以百万计算的商业世界里。不过，王家卫一拖再拖，从月到年的行为，也是情有可原的。因为时间本身——流逝的、难捉摸的、残酷的和消失的时间——是王家卫最重要的主题之一。就像王家卫在五月嘎纳电影节介绍新电影时所说，他担心东邪西毒在时间的流逝中岌岌可危。

　　确切点说，市面上有那么多种不同的印刷品，王家卫受到启发决心制作一个最终版：《东邪西毒终极版》。其实，任何一部电影都没有所谓的结束，在或不在这个数字时代，导演的剪辑只是艺术可塑性的一个表现。D.W. 格里菲思（D. W. Griffith）曾经常常前去放映室剪辑自己即刻就要上映的电影，这种情形我相信王家卫先生一定设想过不止一次。出于审美，他把自己和团队所能找到的《东邪西毒》所有版本集中在一起，打乱顺序，然后调整场景，勾出模糊的人物关系，增加一些马友友的大提琴独奏，重新设计演职员名单，再加深色调。

　　自从几年前看这个电影，我一直没能真正搞明白《东邪西毒》里究竟在讲什么，我重播了两遍才弄懂独白的意思。但是直截了当的叙述从来不是王家卫的风格，时间是他的一切，随着摄像机的移动，昏暗的灯光，闪烁的色彩，姣好的脸庞和爱情挥之不去的伤痛。对于王家卫，一个鸟笼的线条和张国荣脸部的阴影交错，要比哪个演员来演重要的多。

　　这部电影并不受宠，如果不说是被忽略的话，最初的版本在《重庆森林》相比下暗淡不少，而《重庆森林》是王家卫在拍摄《东邪西毒》间歇的七个月内，拍片并且完成。

　　与同等水平的爱情电影相似，讲述冷漠的现代社会和醉生梦死，《重庆森林》就要比《东邪西毒》容易的多，没有那些佛教格言、飘舞的长袍、沙丘和遁天入地。然而，时间证明了《东邪西毒》对于王家卫的发展更加重要，因为在这部电影中，他摆脱掉分类界定，摒弃主流的陈腐，纯碎为了视觉抽象，为了美，为了艺术。（译：言笑晏晏）