杨德昌的声音

近日托本科生小朋友们的福，听到杨德昌的声音。Criterion Collection的《一一》里，附杨先生和影评人Tony Rayns的同声评论。冷峻愤怒的杨德昌，竟然是如此温暖乐天的音质。非常美国的口音，轻微口急，认真组织自己的句子，也会为自己的笑话得意大笑。那场和廖女士一起出境的音乐会，漫溢夫妇的默契和幸福。杨导演要求太太入镜，太太也要求杨导演上场。杨先生欣然应允，录下太太弹琴姿态，躲在琴后努力模仿。是谓夫唱妇随之锦瑟齐鸣。
附上杨德昌解释《一一》主旨。
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Notes from Edward Yang:

On the Title:
Few things in life are as simple as ones and twos. I remember that back in the 1980s, the French newspaper Liberation posed a simple question to filmmakers all around the world for a special Cannes supplement. The question was: “Pourquoi filmez-vous?” My one-line answer was just about as simple as the question: “So I don’t have to speak so much.”

The best thing a director can say should probably be found inside the film he has made, not on the page. This film is very much as simple as the ones and twos in life. I’d like viewers to come away from the film with an impression of having been with a simple friend. If they came away with the impression of having encountered “a filmmaker,” then I’d have to consider the film a failure.

The film is simply about life, portrayed across a spectrum of its span. In my view as the writer, simplicity is what’s at the bottom of the whole lot of complications at the top. Therefore the Chinese title of the film is Yi Yi, which literally translates to “one-one,” and “one-one” means “individually” in Chinese. This signifies the film’s portrayal of life through each individual member at each representing age, from birth to death. “A one and a two and a… ” is what’s always muttered by jazz musicians before a jam session. This is where the English title of the film came from, to signify that what’s following the title is not something tense or heavy or stressful. Life should be like a jazzy tune.