Exist, wander around.

25.3.2022 – #Movies

Directed by Michael Mann

Written by Stuart Beattie

Tom Cruise飾演的職業殺手Vincent，太有魅力，使人對他的過去經歷充滿好奇。每次殺一人，他和Jamie Foxx飾演的的士司機Max都會有一番對話。應該說，由Vincent上車一刻開始就經已耐人尋味。兩套信念系統的相撞，每次Max質疑完Vincent後彷彿都被他反駁得無言以對，抑或是無法理解。兩個立體的角色互相對比，Max懷著壯志十二年，覺得自己正努力謹慎前進，但終究他與夢想保持住一段安全距離。對其他人如是，他不敢完全實現自己，他會有所保留。Vincent則截然不同，冷靜、自信、俐落，充滿處世經驗，有自己獨特見解，nice to everyone，可以在解決目標前與他促膝詳談而旁人渾然不覺，口談盧旺達、宇宙人類渺小論、達爾文、易經，宛若看透世事。如此對立的關係理所當然地牽連到兩人生與死的結局，最後的場面亦呼應了Vincent初始的一席話。

乍看是一套講述殺手的驚悚電影，而情節的確緊張，之餘亦有點超乎想像。戲寫得好，拍得好，演得好。

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—對話欣賞—

第一次殺人後：

VINCENT Now. We have to make the best of it. Improvise. Adapt to the environment. Darwin. “Shit happens.” The I Ching...whatever. Roll with it... MAX I Ching? You threw a man out a window! VINCENT I didn't throw him, he fell. MAX What'd he do to you? VINCENT Nothing. I only met him one time. MAX Then how can you kill him like that? VINCENT I should only kill people after I get to know 'em? Six billion people on the planet and you get bent out of shape 'cause of one fat guy? MAX Who, who was he? VINCENT What do you care? Ever hear of Rwanda? MAX Rwanda. Yeah. VINCENT Tens of thousands killed before sundown. Nobody's killed people that fast since Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Did you bat an eye, Max? Did you join Amnesty International, Oxfam or something? No. (off Max's silence) … MAX I don't know Rwandans. VINCENT You don't know the guy in the trunk, either. (beat) If it makes you feel any better, he was a criminal involved in a Continuing Criminal Enterprise. MAX Oh, that makes it okay, then. 'Cause all you're doing is taking out the garbage... VINCENT Something like that... (distracted) What you need to remember is that nobody gets out of this alive. Even if we quit smoking. Cut out red meat. Everybody dies...

一齊探完Max老母之後：

VINCENT Limos, huh? MAX Don't start. Vincent enters text into a cell phone/pager. VINCENT Hey, I'm not the one lying to my mother. MAX She hears what she wants to hear. I don't disillusion her. VINCENT Yeah, right. Maybe she hears what you tell her. MAX Whatever I tell her's never good enough. It's always been that way... My three older brothers...their wives made 'em move outta town. VINCENT They project onto you their flaws, what they don't like about themselves, their lives, whatever. And then they rank on you, instead... MAX How do you know? VINCENT I had a father like that. MAX Mothers are worse. VINCENT Mine died when I was one. MAX What happened? VINCENT He hated whatever I did. Got drunk. Beat me up all the time. MAX Then what? VINCENT (intimate) I killed him. I was 12. He was the first. (off Max's look) I'm kidding. He died of liver cancer. MAX I'm sorry. VINCENT No you're not. (beat) So driving this cab “temporarily” is all bullshit...? MAX It's not bullshit. VINCENT Twelve years is not temporary. MAX You gotta get cash together. Insurance, bond, maintenance, tires. Staff-up. Client lists. It's not get the car, put asses on seats. VINCENT Why not? MAX 'Cause Island Limos will be more than a ride...like a club experience, a cool groove you don't want to end. Like that. So it's gotta be perfect. Perfect. VINCENT Uh-huh. MAX Plus I got bills. She's been dying of the disease since I was in high school...

關於影響結局的女人：

VINCENT Would you have called her? MAX Who? VINCENT Your lady friend. The one who gave you her business card. (Max is silent) Or was she just being polite? MAX I don't know. VINCENT Why hold back? Why not act off your impulse? Pick up the phone? MAX All I owe a fare is a ride, Vincent. VINCENT It's not what you owe me. Time is fleeting. Life is short. Time is luck. One day it's gone... (beat) You make it out of this alive, you should call her. That's what I think...anyway...

殺咗想救Max出來的差佬後：

MAX Why'd you have to do that? You couldn't wound him? The guy had a family, maybe parents, kids who gotta grow up without a dad, he was a good guy, and he believed me... VINCENT I shoulda saved him 'cause he believed you...? MAX No, not just that. VINCENT Yeah, that... MAX Yeah, so, what's wrong with that? VINCENT It's what I do for a living... MAX Some living. VINCENT Head downtown... MAX What's downtown? VINCENT How are you at math? I was hired for five hits. I did four. MAX (grim) One more. VINCENT There you go...! MAX Whyn't you kill me and find another cab. VINCENT 'Cause you're good. (shrugs) We're in this together. You know...fates intertwined. Cosmic coincidence. All that crap... MAX You're full of shit. VINCENT I'm full of shit? (beat) You're a monument of it. You even bullshitted yourself, all I am is taking out the garbage. Bad guys killing bad guys... MAX 'Cause that's what you said... VINCENT And you believe me...? MAX What'd they do? VINCENT How do I know? (beat) But, they all got that “witness for the prosecution” look to me. It's probably some major federal indictment against somebody who majorly does not want to get indicted... I dunno. MAX That's the reason? VINCENT That's the “why.” There is no reason. (beat) No good reason; no bad reason. To live or to die. MAX Then what are you? VINCENT (looks up) ...indifferent. Get with it. Get over it. ...millions of galaxies of hundreds of millions of stars and a speck on one in a blink...that's us. Lost in space. The universe don't care (about you). (beat) The cop, you, me? Who notices? MAX What's with you...? VINCENT As in...? MAX Man, if someone had a gun to your head and said: “You gotta tell me what's goin' on with that person across the street, there, what they think, who they are, how they feel, or I will kill you”...they'd have to kill you...wouldn't they...? (beat) 'Cause you don't have a clue...about...anyone. (struggling for the words) ...I don't think you, you have a clue, period. Did anyone “do” for you in your life...? Ever? When you draw breath in the morning? Open your eyes in the a.m.? You anticipate...anything? Want anything? Expect anything? I don't think so... (beat) 'Cause you are low, my brother, way low... and some standard parts that are supposed to be there?...with you, aren't. So what happened to you, man? What happened to you? VINCENT ...all the cabbies in LA, I get Max, Sigmund Freud meets Dr. Ruth... MAX Answer the question. VINCENT Look in the mirror. ...with your paper towels...a bottle of 409...a limo company someday. How much you got saved? MAX None of your business. VINCENT Your business “plan?” Someday? “Someday my dream'll come...”? (beat) And one night you'll wake up and discover it all flipped on you. Suddenly you're old. And it didn't happen. And it never will. 'Cause you were never going to do it, anyway. The dream on the horizon became yesterday and got lost. Then you'll bullshit yourself, it could never have been, anyway. And you'll recede it into memory...and zone out in a Barcalounger with daytime TV on for the rest of your life... (beat) Don't talk to me about killing. You're do-in' yourself. In this yellow-and-orange prison. Bit by bit. Every day. All it ever took was a down payment on a Lincoln Town Car. What the hell are you still doing in a cab? MAX 'Cause I never straightened-up and looked at it, you know...? VINCENT Slow down. MAX (ignoring him) ...myself, I should have. My brothers did... (beat) Tried to gamble my way out from under. (That was) Another born-to-lose deal! Then, “it's gotta be perfect to go!” You know? Risk all torqued-down. MAX (CONT'D) But you know what? It doesn't matter. What's it matter, anyway? 'Cause we are...insignificant out here in this big-ass nowhere. Twilight Zone shit. Says the badass sociopath in my backseat. So that's one thing I got to thank you for, bro... Until now, I never saw it that way... The cab goes blasting through an intersection on a red light. A LOS ANGELES TIMES DELIVERY TRUCK SLAM ON ITS BRAKES as Max swerves, barely avoiding a collision. VINCENT That was a red light! Max glances in the rearview. MAX ...not until now. So what's it all matter? It don't. Fuck it. Fix it. Nothing to lose. Right? Vincent's H+K's aimed at Max's head. Max almost laughs. VINCENT Slow the hell down! MAX Why? What are you gonna do? Pull the trigger? Kill us? Go ahead, man! Shoot...my ass. VINCENT Slow down! MAX Vincent? Their eyes meet in the rearview mirror. Vincent is arrested by a look in Max that he's not seen before. It's the even, confrontational look of a man with nothing to lose. MAX (CONT'D) Go fuck yourself.