美国国家公共电台 NPR Richard Linklater's New Film 'Last Flag Flying' Handles The Trauma Of War
时间:2019-01-16 作者:英语课 分类:2017年NPR美国国家公共电台11月
NOEL KING, HOST:
Over the past two decades, director Richard Linklater has made a name for himself as an indie filmmaker's indie filmmaker. Linklater has a style that captures the messy, awkward and sometimes tender rhythm of real life and real conversation. His latest film is called "Last Flag Flying." It's a movie about war, but it's not a war movie in the traditional sense.
"Last Flag Flying" takes a close look at the lingering toll 1 of war across generations and how soldiers make sense of the losses they've endured for their country. The film stars Steve Carell as a Vietnam veteran named Doc Shepherd whose son, a Marine 3, has recently been killed in the Iraq War. Doc sets out to find his old platoon mates, played by Bryan Cranston and Laurence Fishburne, to help him bury his son.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "LAST FLAG FLYING")
LAURENCE FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) Not going to fit. How're you going to get him home now? What are you going to do, Sal, strap 4 the coffin 5 to the roof of your car?
BRYAN CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) We could do that, just need a little help lifting it up. Maybe we can get that kid with the [expletive] up ear.
FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) Don't be ridiculous.
CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) Why not? You know a better way to be? You wish you could be ridiculous, but it's too late now.
FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) Doc, you got to let the government transport the body. I mean, it's the kind of thing they're good at.
STEVE CARELL: (As Larry 'Doc' Shepherd) I don't like the government right now.
FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) You don't have to.
CARELL: (As Larry 'Doc' Shepherd) I don't trust it anymore.
CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) Hey, you know what? We could rent a truck.
KING: Richard Linklater is with us now from our studios in Culver City, Calif. Richard, thanks for being here.
RICHARD LINKLATER: Thanks for having me.
KING: Your work is so often so personal and such a part of your own life. What drew you to a story about wars in Vietnam and Iraq?
LINKLATER: Yeah. Well, you know, I grew up during the Vietnam era. I'd say from that time I could remember to the time I was about 14 years old, we were in that war. And then many years later, I saw our country getting into the Iraq War, you know, very - I was very attuned 6 to that and in the run up to it kind of appalled 7 by the - I don't know - the dialogue got so simpleminded and the slogans. You know, if you weren't for the war, you were unpatriotic. I was just really studying as a kind of an impotent citizen. You know, what can any of us do? You know, you can march. I marched with 4 million people before that war got started. I was just kind of going, wow. I can't believe this is happening. It makes no sense. I mean, they're not a threat to their neighbors, much less us halfway 9 around the globe, but here we go.
But anyway, the film's not specifically about that. It's really about these three Vietnam veterans who've come together because one of their sons has been killed in that war. But it's really about their journey and their reuniting and how they've changed over 30 years or how they've not changed and the echoes of these two wars on each other. So it's really a depiction 11 of that and I guess grieving, but it's also very funny too. You know, it's, you know, Sal's character, the Bryan Cranston character is very funny. He's clearly in a lot of pain and self-medicating, but, you know, he's intent on having a good time no matter what.
KING: This is a movie that obviously has a very heavy tone to it. These three men are traveling to bury the son of one of them. But as you say, there are really some very, very funny moments in it. One of them that cracked me up was these three middle-aged 12 guys are in a mobile phone store. And Bryan Cranston's character, Sal, is trying to convince his two friends to get on board with buying cellphones. Let me - let's play a clip of that.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "LAST FLAG FLYING")
FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) What if I don't like it? I mean, we get stuck with a contract for - what? - a year, two years?
KATE EASTON: (As Phone Shop Clerk) Just two years.
FISHBURNE: (As Sal Nealon) Two years.
CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) What if you fall down, have you thought of that? With your gimpy legs, that's a real possibility. What if you fell into a ditch and you can't get up and nobody can see you? I mean, it is adios, padre. But with your mobile phone, you get it out. And if you can see the numbers, you know, glasses are - oh, I can't see. Help me. Help me. I've fallen, and I can't get up.
EASTON: (As Phone Shop Clerk) Guys - 911 calls don't count against your minutes either.
CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) That's - come on.
FISHBURNE: (As Reverend Richard Mueller) All right. All right. If I say yes, will you shut the hell up so we can get our drink?
CRANSTON: (As Sal Nealon) I'll shut up.
KING: That moment is so natural and so funny. They sound like everybody's dad. How did you pull that off? Were they adlibbing?
LINKLATER: We were trying to depict 10 the last three guys to get cellphones in our culture in '03, you know. Everybody - the last holdouts. But that scene's kind of like every other scene in the movie. You know, we rehearsed a bunch. We really kept working on the script. But the guys are so inventive and bring so much to it, you know. I really like, you know, actors who are intelligent and funny and willing to work hard. But it's pretty much - we shot the same scene, you know, over and over and over all day just like any other production.
KING: Steve Carell pretty much disappears into this role as the grieving father. He's almost unrecognizable. It is extraordinary. Tell me about working with him to develop this character.
LINKLATER: Yeah. I think Steve was coming from a place, I mean, personally, you know, he had - his dad is a World War II vet 2 and kind of stoic 13 and never talked about it much like so many from that generation. And Steve had just lost his mom, so the grief was kind of recent. And he saw how his dad responded.
And, you know, as a parent of two kids that are, you know, teenagers, and that idea of loss and grieving are something - it's something he wanted to explore. And it was really beautiful to see him kind of feel his way through a performance. The worst thing in the world has happened to this guy, so it's really a portrait of that and how you come to terms with the anger and then how you reconcile that with, you know, the commitment that your son's shown to his country also.
KING: For a kind of buddy 14 movie about three middle-aged men, there's not really a sense in this film that they are trying to recapture their youth. They seem like they're trying to get away from it, to get as far away from Vietnam and, indeed, from each other as they can. And I wonder, I'm very curious, a lot of your work has focused on youth. That was "Boyhood," that was "Dazed And Confused," "Everybody Wants Some!!" about a college baseball team. Is this you aging as a director in some way, I wonder?
LINKLATER: (Laughter) Well, middle age had to show up at some point.
(LAUGHTER)
KING: It always does.
LINKLATER: I'm in that phase. Yes, it was fun to portray 15 guys who were, you know, as they look back, you know, their adulthood 16 is - they can look back 30 years and still be adults. You know, this is stuff that happened to them in their 20s in Vietnam. And now, they're in their 50s. I don't know if I totally agree that they're not trying to relive. I think Cranston's character is, you know. Sal, he runs a bar. He hasn't changed that much. He never married or had a family or...
KING: He makes fun of the others for growing up.
LINKLATER: Yeah. He seems to make fun of their maturity 17, that Laurence Fishburne's character, Mueller, has, you know, he has a congregation. He's a man of the cloth. He's leading a very - in his mind - you know, noble life. He's got grandkids and, you know, a purpose. And that just drives Sal crazy. He's just needling him endlessly until he - he wants his old buddy back. He wants the hell-raising guy. So, I mean, Sal's kind of a portrait of a, I guess, stunted 18 growth, alcoholic 19, self-medicating, you know, all these things. But he will take a bullet for you. He will be there for you. You know, his loyalty 20 is unquestioned. Very different responses to their past, I think.
KING: You've made this film. It is entertainment, but it is about very big things. It's about patriotism 21. It's about lies. It's about war. It's about love and friendship. When people walk out of the theater, what do you want them to be thinking about?
LINKLATER: That's a big question. You know, I head into a movie and I don't necessarily know that starting, you know. I really want to explore a subject and figure out what I feel. And obviously, when you get to these subjects, war and, you know, you have a lot of complex feelings - you know, how you feel about the troops, how you feel about the command, you know. It's a - what is patriotism? Who owns the flag? These are big questions that don't get answered very easily. By the end of the movie, these guys who were kind of complaining about the military and this war are in their dress blues 22.
They elected not to bury Larry Jr. in Arlington. They're burying him in his hometown, but they are giving - he's in his dress blues, and they're burying him with a flag, a certain honor. And the guys are in their dress blues folding the flag and going through the rituals. And I've had some people say, you know, that's kind of really patriotic 8 or really this or that. And I'm saying, you can call it whatever you want. They are respecting the commitment of that young soldier who put his life on the line for his country in the purest way. And it's up to the country and the command what they did with that. The patriotic thing is to, actually, if you care about the troops, to make sure that they're actually well taken care of and that if they're going to die, it's going to be really for our freedoms, you know.
KING: Richard Linklater is a director and screenwriter. His new film, "Last Flag Flying," is out in theaters on Friday. He joined us from NPR West in Culver City, Calif. Richard Linklater, thank you so much.
LINKLATER: All right, nice talking to you.
- The hailstone took a heavy toll of the crops in our village last night.昨晚那场冰雹损坏了我们村的庄稼。
- The war took a heavy toll of human life.这次战争夺去了许多人的生命。
- I took my dog to the vet.我把狗带到兽医诊所看病。
- Someone should vet this report before it goes out.这篇报道发表之前应该有人对它进行详查。
- Marine creatures are those which live in the sea. 海洋生物是生存在海里的生物。
- When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时,他自愿参加了海军陆战队。
- She held onto a strap to steady herself.她抓住拉手吊带以便站稳。
- The nurse will strap up your wound.护士会绑扎你的伤口。
- When one's coffin is covered,all discussion about him can be settled.盖棺论定。
- The coffin was placed in the grave.那口棺材已安放到坟墓里去了。
- She wasn't yet attuned to her baby's needs. 她还没有熟悉她宝宝的需要。
- Women attuned to sensitive men found Vincent Lord attractive. 偏爱敏感男子的女人,觉得文森特·洛德具有魅力。 来自辞典例句
- The brutality of the crime has appalled the public. 罪行之残暴使公众大为震惊。
- They were appalled by the reports of the nuclear war. 他们被核战争的报道吓坏了。 来自《简明英汉词典》
- His speech was full of patriotic sentiments.他的演说充满了爱国之情。
- The old man is a patriotic overseas Chinese.这位老人是一位爱国华侨。
- We had got only halfway when it began to get dark.走到半路,天就黑了。
- In study the worst danger is give up halfway.在学习上,最忌讳的是有始无终。
- I don't care to see plays or films that depict murders or violence.我不喜欢看描写谋杀或暴力的戏剧或电影。
- Children's books often depict farmyard animals as gentle,lovable creatures.儿童图书常常把农场的动物描写得温和而可爱。
- Double rhythms, resounding through the lyric depiction and connecting with each other, indicate the thespian place of mankind and the cognition of the writer to this thespian place. 这双重旋律互为表里,表明了人类的某种悲剧性处境以及作家对这种悲剧性处境的感受和认识。
- A realistic depiction of scenes from everyday domestic life. 日常家居生活的写实画。
- I noticed two middle-aged passengers.我注意到两个中年乘客。
- The new skin balm was welcome by middle-aged women.这种新护肤香膏受到了中年妇女的欢迎。
- A stoic person responds to hardship with imperturbation.坚忍克己之人经受苦难仍能泰然自若。
- On Rajiv's death a stoic journey began for Mrs Gandhi,supported by her husband's friends.拉吉夫死后,索尼亚在丈夫友人的支持下开始了一段坚忍的历程。
- Calm down,buddy.What's the trouble?压压气,老兄。有什么麻烦吗?
- Get out of my way,buddy!别挡道了,你这家伙!
- It is difficult to portray feelings in words.感情很难用言语来描写。
- Can you portray the best and worst aspects of this job?您能描述一下这份工作最好与最坏的方面吗?
- Some infantile actions survive into adulthood.某些婴儿期的行为一直保持到成年期。
- Few people nowadays are able to maintain friendships into adulthood.如今很少有人能将友谊维持到成年。
- These plants ought to reach maturity after five years.这些植物五年后就该长成了。
- This is the period at which the body attains maturity.这是身体发育成熟的时期。
- the stunted lives of children deprived of education 未受教育的孩子所过的局限生活
- But the landed oligarchy had stunted the country's democratic development for generations. 但是好几代以来土地寡头的统治阻碍了这个国家民主的发展。
- The alcoholic strength of brandy far exceeds that of wine.白兰地的酒精浓度远远超过葡萄酒。
- Alcoholic drinks act as a poison to a child.酒精饮料对小孩犹如毒药。
- She told him the truth from a sense of loyalty.她告诉他真相是出于忠诚。
- His loyalty to his friends was never in doubt.他对朋友的一片忠心从来没受到怀疑。
- His new book is a demonstration of his patriotism.他写的新书是他的爱国精神的证明。
- They obtained money under the false pretenses of patriotism.他们以虚伪的爱国主义为借口获得金钱。