百年50部英文烧脑电影赏析:[46]The Life of David Gale 大卫·戈尔的一生

David Gale（Kevin Spacey）is a prisoner on death row in Texas. With only a few days to his execution, his lawyer negotiates a half million-dollar fee to tell his story to Bitsey Bloom（Kate Winslet）, a journalist from a major news magazine known for her ability to keep secrets and protect her sources. He tells her the story of how he ended up on death row, revealed to the movie audience through a series of lengthy flashbacks.
Gale is head of the philosophy department at the University of Texas and an active member of DeathWatch, a group campaigning against capital punishment. He loses a televised debate with the Governor of Texas when he is unable to point to example of a demonstrably innocent man being executed. Later, a graduation party, he encounters Berlin（Rhona Mitra）, an attractive female graduate student who had been expelled from the school, corners the inebriated Gale and succeeds in getting him to have rough sex with her She then falsely accuses Gale of rape. Later, she drops the charges and flees, but the negative publicity costs Gale his career, marriage, and reputation.

Constance Harraway（Lara Linney）, a fellow DeathWatch activist, is a close friend of Gale's who consoles him after his life fall apart. However; Harraway is found raped and murdered, suffocated by a plastic bag taped over her head. An autopsy reveals that she had been forced to swallow the key of the handcuffs used to restrain her, a psychological torture technique utilized under the communist regime of Nicolae Ceauşescu, which Gale and Harraway had both protested against. The physical evidence at the crime scene points to Gale, who is convicted of her rape and murder and is, ironically, sentenced to death. In the present Bloom investigates the case in between her visits with Gale. She comes to believe that the apparent evidence against Gale does not add up. She is also tailed several times in her car by a figure who turns out to be Dusty Wright（Matt Craven）, the alleged one-time lover and colleague of Harraway's. Wright slips evidence to Bloom that suggests Gale has been framed, implying that the “real” murderer videotaped the crime. Bloom pursues this lead until she finds a tape revealing that Harraway, who was suffering from terminal leukemia, had committed an elaborate suicide to look like murder. She and Wright are both seen on the videotape, showing that they framed Gale as part of a plan to discredit the death penalty.
Bloom does not find this evidence until the day of Gale's scheduled execution. In a frenzy, she tries to give the tape to the authorities in time to stop the execution. She arrives at the prison just as the warden announces that it has already been carried out. The tape is then released, causing a media and political uproar over the execution of an innocent man. Later, Wright receives the fee that Bloom's magazine agreed to pay for the interview, and delivers it to Gale's ex-wife in Spain, along with a postcard from Berlin apologizing for the false rape accusation. His ex-wife looks distraught, knowing Gale told the truth and that she effectively stole their child away from him.
Much later still a videotape labeled “Off the Record” is delivered to Bloom. This tape picks up at the point where Wright confirmed that Harraway was dead, then continues on to show him stepping aside to allow Gale, also present and party to the suicide, to caress her body. It was in doing this that Gale left his fingerprints on Harraway's plastic suffocation bag.
The plot has some parallels with the 1999 Clint Eastwood drama True Crime, but with a different outcome.
大卫·戈尔（凯文·史派西饰）是德克萨斯州的死刑犯，在离行刑日只剩几天的时候，某主流杂志记者贝西·布鲁姆（凯特·温丝莱特饰）前往采访戈尔，布鲁姆因擅长保守秘密和保护消息来源而出名。戈尔的律师与她协商，以50万美元买下戈尔一路走向死刑犯的经历，整部影片以倒序的方式向观众展示了戈尔的一生。
戈尔原是德克萨斯大学哲学学院的主管，兼任倡导反对死刑的临终看护组织中的一名活跃的成员。在一次电视直播的辩论赛上，他因无法举出无辜人士被执行死刑的例子而败给了德克萨斯州州长。在之后的毕业生晚会上，他遇到了柏林（赫那·米特拉饰），一名早就被学校开除却极具魅力的女研究生，她趁着戈尔喝醉的机会和他发生了性关系，后又诬告他强奸。虽然柏林后来撤消了控诉离开了，但此事给戈尔带来的负面影响让他失去了工作、婚姻和名誉。 康斯坦斯·哈尔威（劳拉·琳妮饰）是临终看护组织的一名激进分子，同时也是戈尔非常要好的朋友，在戈尔陷入困境时一直安慰鼓励他。不久哈尔威遭遇强奸，头部被塑料袋包裹窒息而死。验尸报告显示，哈尔威被迫吞下了束缚她用的手铐钥匙，这是一种心理折磨式的刑罚，是前罗马尼亚领导人尼可拉耶·希奥塞古常用的手段，这种刑罚手段也正是戈尔和哈尔威大力倡议反对的。然而，具有讽刺意义的是，犯罪现场的物证都指向戈尔，戈尔被指控强奸罪和谋杀罪，被判处死刑。
布鲁姆通过采访和调查此案，发现认定戈尔是罪犯的证据并不充分。在此期间，布鲁姆还数次被自称是哈尔威前男友和同事的达斯提·赖特（马特·奎文饰）跟踪，赖特把一些资料塞给布鲁姆，告诉她戈尔是被陷害的，并暗示真正的凶手在犯罪时制作了录像带。布鲁姆凭着线索找到了录像带，发现哈尔威患有白血病，精心制造了一起貌似凶杀的自杀。哈尔威和赖特都出现在录像里，他们故意陷害戈尔，精心策划此案以表达对死刑的质疑。
布鲁姆是在戈尔执行死刑当天，才找到这卷录像带的，她要把录像带及时交给警方，时间非常紧迫。当她赶到监狱时，看守说死刑已经执行。布鲁姆公开了这卷录像，对无辜人士执行死刑这件事引起媒体和政治的骚动。不久，赖特收到了布鲁姆的杂志付给本次采访报道的费用，并把这笔钱寄给了戈尔远在西班牙的前妻，同时她还收到柏林寄来的明信片，为诬陷戈尔强奸一事道歉。戈尔的前妻看后知道了戈尔对她一直是忠诚的，而她却带着孩子离开了戈尔，伤心欲绝。
很久以后，布鲁姆收到了一盘贴着“在录像外”标签的录像带，它从在犯罪现场赖特确定哈尔威死后开始录制，这时赖特退到一旁，戈尔出现了。作为这次自杀的组织参与者，他亲吻了哈尔威的身体，在引起哈尔威窒息的塑料袋上留下了自己的指纹。
这部影片的剧情与1999年克林特·伊斯特伍德主演的戏剧《犯罪真相》一样，但是采用了不同的结局。

execution［ˌeksi'kju:∫ən］n. 执行；实行；完成；死刑
lengthy［'leŋθi］adj. 漫长的；冗长的；啰唆的
demonstrably［'demənstrəbli］adv. 可论证地；明确地
reputation［ˌrepju'teiʃən］n. 名声；名誉；声望
regime［rei'ʒi:m］n. 政权；政体；社会制度；管理体制
ironically［ai'rɔnikli］adv. 讽刺地；说反话地
videotape［'vidiəuteip］n. 录像带
uproar［'ʌprɔ:］n. 骚动；喧嚣
suffocation［ˌsʌfə'keiʃən］n. 窒息；闷死
重点掌握
■ … who consoles him after his life fall apart.
fall apart是英语中一个固定搭配，在文中是“失去自制；失去自信；反常”的意思，比如：Even the seasoned troupers fall apart. 甚至一些有临场经验的演员也失常了。fall apart还有“破碎；破裂；崩溃；瓦解；破产”的意思，比如：The army fell apart. 军队土崩瓦解了。另外，fall apart还可以用于表达“脱离关系；关系破裂”的意思，比如：We used to be good friends, but fell apart about a year ago. 我们过去曾经是好朋友，但大概一年前关系破裂了。

Kevin Spacey Interviewed By Rebecca Murray
Can you describe David Gale?
I play a pretty popular professor of philosophy at a University in Texas. He's also one of the leading opponents of the death penalty. In the course of the film, he's accused of a crime, which you see so you know whether he did it or whether he didn't. And a little later he's accused of the murder of his colleague, which you don't see so you don't know whether he's innocent or guilty. The film operates in this ticking clock manner about whether you'll ever find out if he's innocent or guilty.
Was this a difficult film for you?
I don't know that difficult is the word that I'd use. I think there are challenging scenes but difficult implies that it was hard to get there, or hard to understand what the scenes were all about. Some of the scenes that, for me, were the most important and tender and filled with emotional commitment, ［were the scenes］with Laura Linney. We just had the most extraordinary time developing the relationship. I admire her enormously and her commitment to this part was remarkable. 你能描述一下大卫·戈尔这个人物吗？
我饰演的是德克萨斯一所大学里非常受欢迎的哲学教授，同时也是反对死刑的激进分子。在影片中，他一开始被指控犯罪，你能在影片中看到他是否犯罪。之后他又被指控谋杀同事，这件事没有被拍摄出来，所以你不能确定他是无辜的还是有罪的。本片以定时的形式，让人们一直关注能否在最后一刻找到事实的真相。
拍摄这部影片对你来说困难吗？
我想我不会用“困难”这个词来形容。确实有些场影很有挑战性，但是，“困难”就意味着某些场景很难拍摄或者难以理解。我觉得和劳拉·琳妮的几场对手戏很重要也很细腻，要投入大量的感情。我们相处融洽，拍摄过程顺利，她演技一流，我非常欣赏她。

本片的主题是反对死刑，使得影片在上映时掀起了一次反死刑风暴。
导演艾伦·帕克希望通过此片提醒一些人不要轻而易举地判处被告死刑。
导演艾伦·帕克凭此片获得柏林金熊奖提名。