每一部新的哈利•波特(Harry Potter)系列电影上映，坚定不移的孩子们都会用尖叫、抗议及胡闹等行动，将大人们拖进电影院。“你看了就会喜欢它的，”八岁的孩子不屈不挠地对喝令他们噤声的父母说。但《哈利•波特与凤凰社》(Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix)或许能激起成人的好奇心，甚至可能让他们不再在过道走来走去以分散孩子的注意力。这个系列电影曾经可能沦为数字特技的游乐场——我们希望“别再弄个不可思议的怪物或飞来飞去的东西”——但这一集却罕见地以一种讽刺的方式来展示一个生动的故事情节。
《哈利•波特与凤凰社》(Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix)
艾美达•斯丹顿(Imelda Staunton)在剧中饰演德洛丽丝•乌姆里奇(Dolores Umbridge)——这是个一身粉红行头的女人，有一张能杀死无辜者的笑脸。她是险恶的魔法部(Ministry of Magic)派到霍格沃茨(Hogwarts)的一位教师，她一上任就成了一个眼睛放光的斯大林式人物。她禁止有实用的魔法，欺凌弱小的教师和学生；在她的书房里悬挂着装饰用的图板，上面画着毛茸茸的猫，四处飘荡。她对学校里的罪犯宣读暴动法案时心花怒放且毫不手软。她以“安全”的名义禁止了公民自由。最近我们曾在哪个地方听说过这样的事情？
两年前，斯丹顿在《维拉•德雷克》(Vera Drake)一片中深刻地演绎了愁苦主义，如今她在这部哈利•波特电影中的喜剧表演也体现出极高的水平。她是《爱情之光》(Barbara Cartland)一片的灵魂，塑造了一个在撒切尔时代生活阴影中挣扎的人物形象。多亏她的表演，我们才容忍了意料中的“全国怪物大赛”(Grand National of monsterdom)——人首马身的怪物、长着蝙蝠翅膀的马、拉尔夫•费因斯(Ralph Fiennes)扮演的怪兽脸的伏地魔(Voldemort)等；也接受了各位主角那令人担忧的岁月痕迹，包括丹尼尔•雷德克利弗(Daniel Radcliffe)扮演的哈利、艾玛沃森特(Emma Watson)扮演的赫敏(Hermione)以及鲁伯特•格林特(Rupert Grint)扮演的罗恩(Ron)。他们现在看起来都老得足以有自己的孩子了：对害怕结局的人来说，这是个可怕的想法。
得益于斯丹顿，我们即使在家里也能感觉到这部系列电影美工斯图亚特•克雷格(Stuart Craig)的精湛技艺。这已经成为一个奇迹。他的地下魔法部是一个巨大的陵墓，一排排黑瓦片闪闪发光，有些地方还有镀金的装饰。这不禁让人想到苏联全盛时期的地铁车站，以及新艺术主义者笔下的地狱。这部电影的制作费用超过了历史上任何一部电影，而如此昂贵的制作费用打造出的魔法部高耸的中庭，让迪拜的阿拉伯塔酒店(Burj-al-Arab)看起来就像是一个汉堡王(Burger King)。
在这个系列电影中，罗林(Rowling)笔下复古的魔法学院生活头一次没有让我困惑。我承认，霍格沃茨是那种久远的英国寄宿制学校，是我们中的一些人40年前尖叫着逃离的那种学校。我甚至也承认，那些学生们，坐在小山堆一样多的腊肠、堆积高度赶上珠穆朗玛峰的空心甜饼面前的学生，应该让营养部(Ministry of Nutrition)派遣流行大厨之王杰米奥利弗(Jamie Oliver)来执行一次他的斯大林式镇压活动。但那个阴谋必须等到下一部电影中再出现了：到那时，哈利波特电影已经耗尽了罗林的小说，必须像邦德(Bond)系列一样自己去编写内容了。
《人体雕像》(Taxidermia)
《人体雕像》(Taxidermia)是一部奇怪而又精彩的电影，还是只是怪异而已呢？导演乔治•巴勒菲(Gy?rgi Pálfi)这部讲述匈牙利三代人生活的故事是一部令人作呕的长片。该片开头是图画般的性爱（在二战期间），接着是飞快吃食物的竞赛，然后再将食物吐掉（上世纪60年代），最后演到“今天”，这个古怪家庭中最年幼的子孙打造了一台机器，可以自动挖出动物的内脏，然后对尸体进行防腐处理。这位年轻人的目的是什么呢？为了创造完美的艺术品：他本人。因为他是一位动物标本剥制师。
以英语为母语的人认为，这三段故事包含着“填塞”(stuffing)一词不同的双关语。该片其中两段故事改编自匈牙利诗人拉赫斯•帕提•纳吉(Lajos Parti Nagy)的小说。但的确，在匈牙利语中，这个多重意义的词汇没有完全相等的同义词。如果这种联系是偶然的，那么我们会被这种人类对身体执迷相关的脆弱和谐所包围，成为巴勒菲作品中的朝代解读者。
该片并不完全是《福尔赛世家》(The Forsyte Saga)的翻版。或许，它更胜于《福尔赛世家》：它刻画了一幅达达主义(Dadaist)进化接力赛的历史图片，片中父亲交给儿子的，是一份对生活赤裸裸的欲望和恐惧的可怕准备。巴勒菲曾导演了杰出的电影《田园春光》(Hukkle)，这是一部充满黑色幽默的田园作品，以几乎抽象的手法来观察人类行为和犯罪，从留在自然风景中的足迹可见一斑。这部新片将出其不意地震撼粗心的观众，令胆小的观众感到惊骇，并得到好色之徒讨厌的关注。但它是一个签名，一种智慧，也是一种可怕的力量。
《莫里哀情史》(Molière)
奥斯卡•王尔德(Oscar Wilde)死时还在抱怨他巴黎酒店房间的墙纸。法国墙纸可以说非常肮脏，而法国的时装传记电影甚至更糟：如同会动的墙纸。电影《莫里哀情史》(Molière)的开场画面充满永恒的华丽之光。我们身处17世纪的法兰西，生活不停地在旋转，到处都是宫廷礼节，华丽的服饰，以及相当于“Odzooks”和“Stap me vitals”的法国式对话。
当导演劳伦•泰拉德(Laurent Tirard)决定采取虚构方式时，情况有所好转。他把莫里哀[罗曼•杜利斯(Romain Duris)扮演]想象成一位蓄势待发的年轻演员，与一位拥有土地的富裕绅士[法布莱斯•鲁奇尼(Fabrice Luchini)扮演]住在一起，后者希望学习希腊诗人泰斯庇斯(Thespis)的本事。错综复杂的喜剧场景随之产生。一连串的爱情带来了两个相互竞争的清秀标致的女性[劳拉•莫瑞蒂(Laura Morante)和卢蒂文•萨尼埃(Ludivine Sagnier)饰演]。这些事情都没有真的发生。但是，莫里哀生命中那段未加说明的时期——就像阿加莎•克里斯蒂(Agatha Christie)生命中神秘的空白时期——意味着，电影导演无法拒绝穿着他们12号艺术般的长统雨靴，走入其中。
《莫里哀情史》后面情节的主题、人物和故事要点来自想象，在这种短暂的白日梦中有其本源。该片充满欢乐，没有伤害，富有趣味——至少持续到我们回到“真实的”法国，华丽的墙纸再次开始发光之时。
《麦克白》(Macbeth)
澳大利亚杰弗里•赖特(Geoffrey Wright)导演的电影《麦克白》(Macbeth)却是相反。它选取了莎士比亚苏格兰戏剧中的时期，把它放在今天——墨尔本黑社会的日子。该剧开始踉踉跄跄，因为赖特改变了主线，尽管他抛弃了一些情节，而且很难看到与这位考德的领主(thanes of Cawdor)的相关性，以及与澳洲地下罪犯团伙的类似。赖特还导演了《无法无天》(Romper Stomper)。
相比而言，巫师会更好一些。十几岁的少女们聚在一起，就像围着萨姆•沃辛顿(Sam Worthington)扮演的痛苦麦克白的影迷，甚至幻想在他们第二次露面时与他发生性关系。（巫师会让他们做性梦吗？你必须承认，这是原始的本能。）片中有不错的宴会场面，娇小的麦克白夫人[维多利亚•希尔(Victoria Hill)饰演]，以及对解决柏南树林(Birnam)向杜西宁山(Dunsinane)移动问题的更加聪明的办法。在他墓里做出暗示之后，莎士比亚最后可能会勉强获得尊敬。
Screaming, protesting and misbehaving, adults are dragged off to each new Harry Potter film by stern children. “You will watch it and you will enjoy it,” says the unrelenting eight-year-old to the parent having a hissy fit. But Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix may pique grown-ups' curiosity; it may even stop them running up and down the aisles distracting attentive children. A series that was in danger of becoming an adventure playground for digital trickery – “not another miraculous monster or flying thingummybob”, we protest – exhibits, for once, a strong plot with a satirical edge.
Imelda Staunton plays Dolores Umbridge with an all-pink wardrobe and a smile that could slaughter innocents. She is the teacher sent to Hogwarts by the sinister Ministry of Magic. Once in place she becomes a twinkle-eyed Stalin. She bans practical magic, bullies teachers and pupils, and in her study hung with decorative plates featuring fluffy, moving cats, she reads the riot act – ever so sweetly and implacably – to school criminals. Her closedown of civil liberties is all in the name of “security”. Where have we been hearing this sort of thing recently?
Two years after plumbing the depths of miserablism in Vera Drake, Staunton reaches high comic form. She is the ghost of Barbara Cartland mugged by the living shade of Baroness Thatcher. Thanks to her performance, we put up with the expected Grand National of monsterdom – centaurs, bat-winged horses, Ralph Fiennes gurning as gargoyle-faced Voldemort – and accept the alarming cubits added by age to Daniel Radcliffe's Harry, Emma Watson's Hermione and Rupert Grint's Ron. They now each look old enough to parent their own Harry, Hermione and Ron: a frightening thought for the sequel-nervous.
Thanks to Staunton, we even feel at-home enough to appraise, at proper measure, the decor by the series designer Stuart Craig. This is becoming a thing of wonder. His underground Ministry of Magic is a gigantic mausoleum lined with shiny black tiles with outbreaks of gilded ornamentation. Think of a heyday Soviet subway station combined
with an art nouveau Hades. The towering atrium, touted in the production statistics as bigger than any in film history, makes the Burj-al-Arab look like Burger King.
For once in a Potter movie, the weird regressiveness of Rowling's scholastic world failed to trouble me. I accepted Hogwarts as a throwback British boarding school, the kind that some of us escaped from, screaming, 40 years ago. I even accept that the pupils sit at meals – mountains of sausages, Everests of profiteroles – that should make the Ministry of Nutrition dispatch Jamie Oliver, pop tsar of responsible foodyism, to implement his own Stalinist crackdown. But that plot must wait for another movie: for the time when the Potter screen machine runs out of Rowling novels and must start, like the Bond franchise, to invent its own.
Is Taxidermia weird and wonderful, or just weird? Gy?rgi Pálfi's three-generation tale of Hungarian lives is a gross-out marathon. It starts with graphic sex (during the second world war), segues through speed-eating contests and vomiting (1960s), and ends “today” with the youngest scion of a wacky family (Marc Bischoff) building a machine for auto-evisceration-and-embalmment. The young man's object? To create the perfect work of art: himself. For he is a taxidermist.
Anglophones have theorised that the three episodes, two based on stories by Lajos Parti Nagy, comprise different puns on the word “stuffing”. But there is no exact equivalent of that multi-task word, surely, in Hungarian. And if that connectivity is coincidental, we are left with flimsier harmonies concerning the human obsession with the body as Pálfi's dynastic chronicle unspools.
It is not exactly The Forsyte Saga. More, perhaps, The Foresight Saga: a picture of history as a Dadaist- evolutionary relay race in which fathers hand on to sons a gruesome readiness for life's raw appetites and horrors. Pálfi made the marvellous Hukkle, a black-comedy pastoral almost abstract in its observation of human doings and misdoings, as seen by the footprints left in landscape and nature. The new film will ambush the unwary, appal the squeamish and get unwanted attention from the prurient. But it has a signature, a wit and a kind of grim strength.
Oscar Wilde died complaining of the wallpaper in his Paris hotel room. French wallpaper can be a nasty thing and French costume biopics even worse: wallpaper in motion. The early scenes of Molière shimmer with a self-replicating floridity. We are in a 17th-century France where life is on an audiovisual loop, all arch etiquette, frou-frou'd costumes and the French- dialogue equivalents of “Odzooks” and “Stap me vitals”.
Things improve when filmmaker Laurent Tirard decides to go fictional. He imagines Molière (Romain Duris), as a young pre-stellar actor, taking up residence with a rich landed gent (Fabrice Luchini) who wants to learn the craft of Thespis. Comic imbroglios ensue. The merry-go-round of love whisks up competitively comely females (Laura Morante, Ludivine Sagnier). None of this really happened. But an unaccounted-for period in Molière's life – just like that mystery hiatus in Agatha Christie's that gave us Agatha – means moviemakers cannot resist stepping in with their size-12 artistic wellies.
Themes, characters and story points from Molière's later plays are imagined having their fons et origo in this fantasy sojourn. It is all jolly, harmless and amusing – at least until we get back to the “real” France and the ornate wallpaper starts shimmering again.
Geoffrey Wright's Macbeth, from Australia, does the opposite. It takes the period frou-frou out of Shakespeare's Scottish play by setting it in present-day Melbourne gangland. The play totters at first since Wright, who made Romper Stomper, changes barely a line, though jettisoning several dozen, and it is hard to see the relevance of thanes of Cawdor and the like to the Aussie crime underworld.
The witches fare better. As teenage nymphets they cluster like groupies around Sam Worthington's troubled, rock-starrish Macbeth and even strip for a fantasised orgy with him in their second appearance. (The witches as a wet dream? You have to admit it's original.) There is a good banquet scene, a lissom Lady Macbeth (Victoria Hill) and a clever solution to the Birnam-comes-to-Dunsinane problem. After a few early spins in his grave, Shakespeare may end up grudgingly respectful. （实习编辑：顾萍）