好萊塢不會告訴你的10件事

10 Things Hollywood Won't Tell You

by CHARLES PASSY

1. "The real nail-biter? Our balance sheet."
Picture it: captains of industry struggling to stay relevant in a world they no longer understand. It may sound like a Citizen Kane-esque cinematic saga, but it's actually the story of today's studio executives, say film-industry watchers. The U.S. box office take dropped almost 4 percent in 2011, to $10.2 billion, marking the second straight year of decline. The root of the problem, of course, is the growing popularity of home viewing via Netflix and other video-on-demand outlets. Last year, consumer spending on video streaming jumped 50 percent, to $3.4 billion, reports the Digital Entertainment Group. The change has as many implications for the movie business as digital downloading did for the music industry. Granted, Hollywood makes some money from streaming sales. But those digital dimes aren't enough. Add it up and you have a potential crisis, says Christopher Sharrett, a professor of communication and film studies at Seton Hall University: "We could well be seeing the end of motion pictures in theaters."

1. “真正扣人心弦的是我們的資產負債表。”
想象一下：行業領頭人們奮力在一個自己不再了解的世界里保持與時俱進，這聽起來像是公民凱恩式的電影傳奇，但電影業觀察人士說，實際上這的確是目前電影公司高管們的狀態。美國電影總票房2011年下滑了近4%，至102億美元，已經是連續第二年下滑。當然，問題的根源在于家庭通過Netflix及其他視頻點播渠道觀影的方式越來越流行。據數字娛樂集團（Digital Entertainment Group）發布的報告，去年，消費者在流媒體視頻上的支出上漲了50%，達到34億美元。這種變化對電影業的影響與數字下載對音樂行業的影響如出一轍。的確，好萊塢從在流媒體的銷售上賺了些錢。但這些是不夠的。塞頓霍爾大學（Seton Hall University）傳播及影視學教授克里斯托弗•沙萊特（Christopher Sharrett）說，綜合起來算算，就會發現存在潛在的危機；我們幾乎能清楚地預見到電影在影院的終結。


2. "3-D is for suckers."
So what are moviemakers doing to bring more bodies into theaters? They're revisiting an innovation of decades past: 3-D. And not everyone who tracks Hollywood is wild about the trend, saying it's a passing fad. Plus, action films don't always translate well to 3-D. Boston Globe film writer Ty Burr recently carped about the "sins against the visual cortex" perpetrated by 3-D releases Clash of the Titans,Gulliver's Travels and Green Lantern: They "aren't just terribly written, they're terrible to look at, with actors' faces separated from the backs of their heads," he wrote. Of course, Hollywood doesn't quite see it that way. In a 2010 interview, Clash of the Titans director Louis Leterrier praised today's 3-D, saying what viewers see on the screen is "exactly what it looked like on set." But either way, consumers are paying the price for the new-old technology: Admission to a 3-D flick is generally $3 extra.

2. “3D是給笨蛋看的。”
那么電影制片商在用什么辦法讓更多的人進影院呢？他們開始再度采用好幾十年前的一種創新技術：3D。并非每個追隨好萊塢的人都對這種趨勢感興趣，他們說3D只是曇花一現。另外，動作片也不是總能很好地轉換成3D制式。《波士頓環球報》（Boston Globe）影評人泰•波爾（Ty Burr）對最近《諸神之戰》（Clash of the Titans）、《格列佛游記》（Gulliver's Travels）和《綠燈俠》（Green Lantern）3D版本上映“對視覺皮層犯下的罪行”發起了牢騷：他寫道，這些電影不但劇本寫得很糟糕，看起來也很糟糕，演員的臉和后腦勺都是分開的。當然，好萊塢可不這么看。在2010年的一次采訪中，《諸神之戰》的導演路易斯•萊特瑞爾（Louis Leterrier）對現在的3D大加贊賞，說觀眾在屏幕上看到的“和現實場景一模一樣”。但無論如何，消費者都在為這種獲得新生的舊技術多花錢：3D版票價一般要貴出三美元。


3. "Movies are thinly veiled commercials."
Many moviegoers may recall how a trail of Reese's Pieces lures the alien out of hiding in E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial. That's classic Hollywood product placement, circa 1982. Attracting an alien nowadays would require much bigger bait: Hollywood has increasingly come to rely on Madison Avenue for income. Indeed, product placement has doubled in value since 2005, to an estimated $1.8 billion. This blurring of the lines between entertainment and advertising -- a practice consumer advocates condemn -- has become so ubiquitous someone even made a movie about it: Documentarian Morgan Spurlock, of Super Size Me fame, spoofed the trend in his 2011 picture Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold (he financed the $1.5 million film through sponsorships). But Hollywood argues that it's a necessary part of doing business -- and that ticket sales alone don't cut it: "Somebody has to pay for all this content to be created," says Lindsay Conner, a Los Angeles attorney who has represented film studios.

3. “電影就是赤裸裸的廣告。”
許多電影觀眾也許還能回想起影片《E.T.外星人》（The Extra-Terrestrial）中里斯巧克力豆（Reese's Pieces）引出外星人的橋段。那是1982年左右經典的好萊塢植入式廣告。現在要吸引外星人可能需要更大的誘餌：好萊塢越來越依賴麥迪遜大街來創收。的確，植入式廣告帶來的利潤從2005年以來翻了一番，達到約18億美元。這種對娛樂和廣告之間界限的模糊遭到消費者權益倡導者的譴責，它已經變得無處不在，甚至有人專門為此拍了部電影：以紀錄片《大號的我》（Super Size Me）出名的紀錄片導演摩根•斯普爾洛克（Morgan Spurlock）在他2011年的影片《有史以來賣得最好的電影》（Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold，這部影片150萬美元的成本都來自贊助商）中對這種趨勢進行了諷刺。但好萊塢認為，這是商業運行的必要組成部分，僅靠賣票是沒法賺錢的：為電影公司代理過的洛杉磯律師林賽•康納（Lindsay Conner）說，“總得有人為這些創造出來的內容埋單。”


4. "New York? Chicago? It's all Vancouver."
When Hollywood wants to use a particular city as a backdrop, it faces a choice: scout out settings and deal with potentially pricey or problematic local production crews, or head to a place that has a similar look and is eager to please, particularly when it comes to government financial incentives. Frequently, it chooses the latter, regardless of the possible visual compromise. As a result, some states, such as Michigan and Louisiana, have become hotbeds of production. And Canada -- especially the cities of Toronto and Vancouver -- has become such a hub that it's been dubbed Hollywood North. Even when a specific location is central to a plotline, filmmakers won't hesitate to shoot elsewhere. A case in point: The 2002 Reese Witherspoon romantic comedy Sweet Home Alabama was shot largely in Georgia, because it offered scenic locations and a solid crew of film professionals, explains Michael Fottrell, the film's executive producer. An added bonus, says Fottrell: Some New York scenes could be filmed in Atlanta.

4. “紐約？芝加哥？其實都是溫哥華。”
當好萊塢想用某個特定城市做背景時，會面臨一個選擇：找到合適的場景，與可能要價昂貴或要求很多的當地攝制劇組打交道，或者前往一個看起來相似且急于討好制片方的地方，特別是如果還有政府財政獎勵的話。盡管視覺效果可能會打折，但好萊塢常會選擇后者。結果，有些州，比如密歇根和路易斯安那，就成為了拍攝電影的熱門去處。加拿大──特別是多倫多和溫哥華──由于太熱門而被稱為“北好萊塢”。即便某個地點對情節至關重要，制片方也會毫不猶疑地在別的地方進行拍攝。一個例證是：2002年，瑞茜•威瑟斯彭（Reese Witherspoon）主演的浪漫喜劇《情歸阿拉巴馬》（Sweet Home Alabama）主要是在佐治亞州拍攝的，該片執行制片人邁克爾•佛瑞爾（Michael Fottrell）解釋說，因為該州有風景優美的場景，還有功底扎實的專業攝制劇組。他說，還有一個好處是，有些本應在紐約拍的鏡頭可以在亞特蘭大拍。


5. "We boost sales by limiting your options."
It should come as no surprise that Hollywood times the release of youth-oriented "popcorn flicks" to the out-of-school summer months. But it might surprise people just how far studios take the timing game the rest of the year: If they deem a film unlikely to make a splash at the box office, industry observers say, they'll release it on a slow, off-season weekend -- so it won't have to compete with higher-profile fare, and so it will require fewer marketing dollars. In short, by minding the calendar (as well as the competition) and ultimately limiting options for moviegoers, studios are able to sell more tickets to movies that might otherwise be commercial disappointments, explains Paul Dergarabedian, president of Hollywood.com's box office division. "The scheduling of release dates is like a giant chess match," he says.

5. “我們通過限制你們的選擇來促進票房銷售。”
好萊塢把主打年輕人的“爆米花電影”安排在暑期放映，這應該沒什么奇怪的。但如果知道電影公司在其他時間是怎么玩時間游戲的，人們可能會大吃一驚：行業觀察人士說，如果他們覺得一部電影不可能引起票房轟動，就會選在不景氣的淡季周末上映，這樣就不必和更受關注的影片競爭，需要的宣傳費用也更少。好萊塢網(Hollywood.com)票房部總裁保羅•德加拉伯迪安(Paul Dergarabedian)解釋說，簡言之，通過精心安排時間表（以及競爭）并最終限制觀眾的選擇，電影公司就能讓可能會賠錢的電影賣出更多的票。他說，上映時間的安排就像是一場巨型的象棋比賽。


6. "We scratch Washington's back..."
Yep, even Hollywood has a lobbying arm: the Motion Picture Association of America, which spent more than $2 million wooing elected officials last year. And its positions aren't always popular with either the public or politicians. Recently, the association, under the stewardship of former U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd, pushed for antipiracy legislation designed to keep films from being easily shared and copied online. But the bills were seen as restricting the overall use of the Internet and failed to garner support. After Congress put the legislation on hold, Dodd warned that "those who count on 'Hollywood' for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who's going to stand up for them when their job is at stake." That led some critics to charge that the MPAA was bullying legislators and prompted an online petition asking the White House to "investigate this blatant bribery." The Obama administration declined to comment on the petition.

6. “我們會討好華盛頓……”
是的，就連好萊塢都有游說機構：美國電影協會（Motion Picture Association of America，簡稱MPAA），由美國前參議員克里斯•多德（Chris Dodd）擔任主席。該協會去年斥資200多萬美元爭取當選官員的支持。協會的立場并不總是受到公眾或政客的歡迎。最近，該協會敦促反盜版立法，以防止電影在網絡上被輕易分享和拷貝。但這些法案被認為是限制互聯網的整體使用，因此未能獲得支持。國會將該項立法擱置后，多德警告說，“指望‘好萊塢’支持的那些人”需要明白，這個行業正在密切關注著，當他們的工作危在旦夕時，誰會站出來為他們撐腰。此言一出，有些評論家就指責說，美國電影協會是在威脅立法人員，并在網上發起請愿書，要求白宮“調查這種明目張膽的賄賂”。奧巴馬政府拒絕就請愿書置評。


7. "Based on a true story...loosely."
Truth is often stranger than fiction, which explains Hollywood's enthusiasm for telling true stories. There's just one problem: Sometimes reality gets in the way of the narrative or spoils the tone of a film. So Hollywood changes it. Not everyone necessarily has a problem with that, though. Chris Gardner, the homeless man-turned-financial whiz whose story was chronicled in the 2006 Will Smith picture The Pursuit of Happyness, says he understood why the film's creators changed the age of his son. In real life, the events played out when his child was still in diapers; in the movie, he's 5. The reason? It's hard to capture those poignant father-and-son moments without dialogue, so the child had to be of speaking age. Overall, says Gardner, "I could not be more happy" with the film.

7. “根據真實故事改編……大體上。”
現實往往比小說更離奇，這就解釋了為什么好萊塢熱衷于講述真實故事。只不過存在一個問題：有時現實會妨礙故事的敘述或破壞影片的基調。所以好萊塢會進行改編。不過并非每個人都對這點有意見。2006年威爾•史密斯（Will Smith）主演的電影《當幸福來敲門》（The Pursuit of Happyness）講述了從流浪漢變成金融奇才的克里斯•加德納（Chris Gardner）的故事。加德納說，他理解為什么電影制片方更改了他兒子的年齡。在真實生活中，故事發生在他兒子還在用尿布的時候，而在電影里他兒子是五歲。原因何在？這是因為，很難在沒有對話的情況下捕捉那些感人的父子共處的時刻，因此孩子就得是在會說話的年齡。加德納說，整體來說，對這部電影“我是再滿意不過了”。


8. "What you see isn't what you'll get."
If you've ever felt cheated after seeing a movie that failed to deliver on what its trailer promised, you're not alone. Moviegoers are increasingly sounding the alarm that Hollywood plays a game of bait-and-switch, building marketing campaigns that present a false sense of a picture's style or subject matter. And at least one film buff has gone to the courts to make the case: A Michigan woman filed suit in September against a Hollywood distributor, saying that she was led to believe, through advertising, that the Ryan Gosling thriller Drive was about, well, driving. Instead, the film "bore very little similarity to a chase, or race action film," the suit alleged. And the reaction from Drive producer Graham King? "It's called marketing, you know?" he said in a 2011 interview. The suit was dismissed in March.

8. “所見并不一定是所得。”
如果你曾在看完一部電影后有被騙的感覺，覺得電影沒有傳達出預告片所承諾的東西，那么我告訴你，不止你一個人有這種感覺。電影觀眾日益感到警覺，認為好萊塢在玩誘導轉向的把戲，其營銷活動制造了影片風格或主題的假象。至少有一個影迷對此向法院提出了控告：密歇根的一名女性9月份向一家好萊塢發行商提起訴訟，說廣告讓她以為瑞恩•高斯林（Ryan Gosling）主演的驚悚片《亡命駕駛》（Drive）是同駕駛有關的。而事實上，該訴訟指稱，這部電影“跟追捕或賽車動作片幾乎沒有什么相關”。《亡命駕駛》制片人格雷厄姆•金（Graham King）作何反應？他在2011年的一次采訪中說，“這叫做營銷，懂不懂？”法院在3月份駁回了訴訟。


9. "We've got a bad case of sequelitis."
It's not an actual illness, but sequelitis is the term movie critics use to describe Hollywood's obsession of late with pictures that have a numeral in their title. Of last year's 10 highest-grossing films worldwide, nine were sequels. (The lone exception? The Smurfs -- and even that's practically a sequel, since the little blue creatures gained earlier fame as stars of an animated television series.) But if moviegoers are happy to buy tickets to these pictures-cum-franchises, who's being harmed? Movie mavens maintain it's stifling originality and resulting in the further commercialization of an industry that's already overcommercialized. "It's like, 'We can milk anything,'" says Sean Phillips, executive producer of the Yahoo Movies website.

9. “我們有嚴重的續集綜合癥。”
這不是一種真實的疾病，但影評人用“續集綜合癥”來形容好萊塢近來對在電影片名中采用數字的熱衷。去年全球票房最高的10部電影中，有九部都是續集。（唯一的例外是《藍精靈》（The Smurfs），即便這部片子嚴格來說也是續集，因為這些小巧的藍色生物在電視系列動畫片中早已經成為了明星。）但如果電影觀眾樂意買票看這些電影系列片，又有什么壞處呢？電影專家認為這會扼殺獨創性，會導致已經過度商業化的電影業進一步商業化。雅虎電影（Yahoo Movies）網站執行制作人肖恩•菲利普斯（Sean Phillips）說，“就好像是說，我們從什么東西身上都能榨出錢來。”


10. "Of course we recycle. It pays."
Sequels may represent the artistic equivalent of recycling, but Hollywood also profits from its real leftovers. As recently as a decade ago, studios extracted silver from the physical prints that theaters sent back following a film's run, resulting in hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in added profits, according to Edward Jay Epstein, a film-business expert and the author of The Hollywood Economist 2.0. And today, the industry channels used props and costumes to auction houses that cater to the growing market of movie-mad collectors. The only problem with the squeeze-every-penny-out-of-a-picture mentality is that it's part of the "culture of the suits," Epstein says. In that culture, extra pennies go straight into studio coffers or toward blatantly commercial projects -- say, another Smurfs movie. Sure enough, a sequel is already in the works.

10.“我們當然會循環利用。能賺錢。”
續集也許意味著藝術上的循環利用，但好萊塢也在從真正的殘余物中獲利。電影行業專家、《好萊塢經濟學家2.0》（The Hollywood Economist 2.0.）一書作者愛德華•杰伊•愛普斯坦（Edward Jay Epstein）說，就在十年前，電影公司還在從影院在影片放映完后送回的拷貝中提取銀，每年從中能獲得幾十萬美元的額外利潤。如今，電影行業把用過的道具和服裝拿到拍賣行，專門針對日益擴大的影迷收藏市場。愛普斯坦說，這種把每部電影都榨得一干二凈的心態唯一的問題在于，它是“系列文化”的一部分。在這種文化中，額外的錢直接進入電影公司的金庫或公然用于商業項目，比如拍攝另一部藍精靈電影。毫無疑問的是，下一集早就已經在籌備之中了。

CHARLES PASSY