Where’d It Come from:John Wayne’s Screenplays约翰·韦恩的电影剧本从哪儿来

译/张菊

《山岗上的牧羊人》（导演亨利·哈撒韦，1941年）

因健康原因前往南密苏里州之前，纽约州罗马市的哈罗德·贝尔·赖特对欧扎克斯山脉一无所知。他在当地人“老马特”和“莫莉姨”拥有的乡村土地上露营，听他们讲民间故事入了迷，外地人从未听过那些故事。赖特用生动的笔触快速记下那些富有乡村特色且亦真亦幻的故事，然后写成了一部小说——《山岗上的牧羊人》（1907）。一些学者坚持认为，这是除《圣经》外第一部销量超过100万册的书。赖特抓住了这个独特的亚文化的本质，并公之于众。在该故事的电影版里，韦恩和哈里·凯瑞分别扮演乡村青年和神秘老者。电影色彩柔和，贴合赖特独特散文叙事的忧伤调子以及“山岗生活风格”。如今，根据影片改编的华丽露天舞台剧依然定期在密苏里州布兰森的老厂剧院上演。

《荒漠三雄》（导演约翰·福特，1948年）

对于商业小说及其亚体裁西部小说的铁粉来说，彼得·B.凯恩的第一部小说是重中之重。《荒漠三雄》最初发表于1913年，实际是圣经故事《三智者》的寓言式重述。好莱坞早期西部片偶像哈里·凯瑞扮演1916年第一部电影版的主角。默片时代，年轻的约翰·福特两次将其搬上银幕：1919年以《嫌疑犯》之名，1926年以《三个坏蛋》之名。1948年，福特又以彩片的形式翻拍了这个故事，大量加入他爱尔兰式的幽默和天主教虔诚的救赎思想，引起了一场美国大沙漠的视觉冲击。“福特老爹”将他的电影献给了当时刚刚过世的凯瑞。在韦恩之前，凯瑞是他最喜欢的影星。这本书出名的原因是：与这部外粗内秀的硬汉文学之作相比，没有哪部西部小说被改编为电影这么多次。

《蛮国战笳声》（导演约翰·法罗，1953年）

“这是我读过的最好的西部小说。”“公爵”约翰·韦恩某天如是评价路易斯·拉穆尔的《蛮国战笳声》，就在当天，韦恩的电影和拉穆尔的书同时面世。可别以为韦恩是读了小说后决定拍成电影的。他早先碰巧读到《科齐斯的礼物》——拉穆尔发表在《科利尔》杂志（1952年第7期）上的一个故事——觉得有可能拍成电影，于是买下了这个故事的版权。韦恩让他最喜欢的作家詹姆斯·爱德华·格兰特将其改编成电影剧本。格兰特几乎把什么都改了，连主角的名字也从切斯改成了翁多（这个名字他在1947年出版的《天使和坏人》中给一个坏人用过）。拉穆尔保留了重写格兰特剧本的权利，并且这么做了。成书的故事极其接近改编的电影剧本，并且在描写翁多·莱恩时，他实际就以韦恩为原型了。结果，韦恩就是翁多，翁多就是韦恩。这或许是第一个电影“小说化”成书的实例，而非由小说到电影——现在则成了常态。

《赤胆屠龙》（又译《赤胆忠魂》）（导演霍华德·霍克斯，1959年）

除了韦恩和霍华德·霍克斯，人人都喜欢《正午》（1952）。他俩鄙视这样自由随意的情节发展，该片中，典型的美国市镇居民被表现得没有一点儿骨气，一个执法者（加里·库珀扮演）居然祈求他人帮助。这个角色对他们来说简直难以置信，被拒绝时居然会哭，最后被一个女人拯救！他们从比尔·麦坎贝尔鲜为人知的故事中取材，决定拍一部电影来“回应”斯坦利·克雷默的这部传道片。影片团队与作家朱尔斯·福瑟曼一起，将故事拓展成了《赤胆屠龙》。影片中，镇上的居民尽力帮助警长，但韦恩扮演的约翰·T.钱斯却拒绝了他们的帮助。钱斯宁可独自面对坏人，但他也确实接受了一些帮助，这些人的帮助都是《正午》中的威尔·凯恩所拒绝的：一个自大的小不点、镇上的酒鬼和一个老跛子。具有讽刺意味的是，几十年后，比尔·巴克利的右倾杂志《国家评论》却选了《正午》而非《赤胆屠龙》作为史上最伟大的“保守派西部片”。

《边城英烈传》（又译《锦绣山河烈士血》）（导演约翰·韦恩，1960年）

从1946年开始，韦恩就想在共和电影公司拍一部阿拉莫题材的电影。他本应在《记住阿拉莫》中扮演山姆·休斯敦，但那个项目被搁置了。随后，韦恩提议让吉姆·鲍伊来拍西·巴特利特和沃伦·达夫的剧本。公司老总赫伯特·J.耶茨因300万美元的巨额预算拒绝了韦恩的提案。韦恩离开了公司却未能带走剧本。共和电影公司转而与斯特林·海登合作，匆匆拍成了《最后的命令》（1955）。韦恩与詹姆斯·爱德华·格兰特合作编写了新的剧本，拍摄了《边城英烈传》，韦恩扮演戴维·克罗克特。该片被误认为票房灾难，但其实它上映后是美国第三受欢迎的电影。跟耶茨相比，后来者大约翰笑到了最后。《最后的命令》花费了100万美元，但亏损严重，公司最终倒闭收场。 □

Sometimes the stories from behind the scenes are as interesting as the movies themselves.幕后故事有时跟电影一样有趣。

SHEPHERD OF THE HILLS (Henry Hathaway, dir.; 1941)

Harold Bell Wright of Rome, N.Y.1美国纽约州罗马市，美国纽约州中部城市，位于纽约州奥奈达郡的中心。,knew nothing about the Ozarks until he headed to southern Missouri for health reasons. Camping out in a rural area owned by locals “Old Matt” and “Aunt Mollie,” he listened spellbound while they spun folk yarns no outsider had ever before heard. Wright jotted down vivid descriptions of the phantasmagoria2phan-tasmagoria （真实或幻觉形象的）变换情景，幻觉效应。and the rustic, local geography then penned a novel, Shepherd of the Hills(1907). Some literati insist it was the first book—other than the Bible—to sell more than a million copies. Wright captured the essence of this unique subculture and shared it with the world. In the movie version, Wayne and Harry Carey played the young swain and older mystery man respectively. The film was shot in subdued colors that caught the melancholy ring of Wright’s quaint prose and the unique “hill lifestyle.” A lavish outdoor stage production is still regularly performed at the Old Mill Theatre in Branson, Mo.

3 GODFATHERS (John Ford, dir.;1948)

For diehard fans of pulp fiction3pulp fiction 粗制滥造的小说，庸俗小说，商业小说，低级趣味小说。and its Western sub-genre, Peter B. Kyne’s first novel is the end all be all4end all beall 最重要的. Originally published in 1913, 3 Godfathers is an allegorical retelling of the Biblical tale of the Three Wise Men. Hollywood’s early Western icon Harry Carey played the lead in the initial film version(1916). Young John Ford brought it to the screen twice during the silent era, in 1919 as Marked Men and 1926 in Three Bad Men. Ford eventually retold the tale in 1948 as a full-color epic, adding large dollops of his sentimental Irish humor and soulful Catholic redemption, creating an ocular essay on the great American desert. “Pappy”55约翰·福特比约翰·韦恩大15岁，二人形同父子，韦恩称福dedicated his film to the recently deceased Carey, who had ranked as his favorite star previous to Wayne. The book’s claim to fame: No other piece of Western fiction has been adapted more often to the screen than this hardboiled literary diamond-in-therough6diamond in the rough 有潜力（潜在价值）的人（物），外粗内秀的人（物）。.

HONDO (John Farrow, dir.; 1953)

“The best Western novel I’ve ever read,” the Duke said of Hondo by Louis L’Amour on the day when both Wayne’s film and L’Amour’s book were released. Don’t think, however, that Wayne had read the novel then decided to film it. He’d come across “The Gift of Cochise,” a L’Amour story in Collier’s magazine (7/1952), saw some possibilities, and optioned7option购买（或出售）……的选择权。the piece.Duke assigned his favorite writer, James Edward Grant, to fashion a screenplay.Grant changed most everything, including the hero’s first name, from Ches to Hondo (a name he had also employed for a villain in Angel and the Badman,1947). L’Amour had retained the rights to rewrite Grant’s script into book form and did so, honing close to the altered version and actually describing Wayne when it came time to introduce Hondo Lane. Now, Wayne was Hondo and Hondo, Wayne. This may have been the first ever case of “novelization” from film to book instead of the opposite,which remains the norm.

RIO BRAVO (Howard Hawks, dir.;1959)

Everyone fell in love with High Noon(1952)—everyone except Wayne and Howard Hawks. They despised what they considered to be a liberal agenda,with typical American townsfolk portrayed as spineless and a lawman (Gary Cooper) begging for help. It was inconceivable to them that such a character would cry for being spurned then be rescued by a... woman! They agreed to make a film to “answer” Stanley Kramer’s message movie, drawing from an obscure story by Bill McCampbell.Working with writer Jules Furthman,the team expanded it into Rio Bravo,in which the townsfolk try to help the sheriff, but Wayne’s John T. Chance turns them down. Chance prefers to face the badmen alone, yet does accept some aid from the only types that Will Kane in High Noon had rejected: a cocky kid, the town drunk, and an old cripple.Ironically, decades later, Bill Buckley’s right-leaning National Review chose High Noon over Rio Bravo as the greatest “conservative Western” of all time.

THE ALAMO (John Wayne, dir.; 1960)

Wayne had wanted to make an Alamo movie at Republic since 1946.He would have played Sam Houston in Remember the Alamo, but when that project was shelved, Wayne enlisted Jim Bowie to work with a Sy Bartlett/Warren Duff script. But studio head Herbert J. Yates rejected Wayne’s proposal due to the then outrageous $3 million budget. Wayne walked but wasn’t able to take the script with him. Republic turned around and rushed it into production as the Last Command (1955) with Sterling Hayden. The Duke went to work on a new scenario with James Edward Grant and released The Alamo, in which Wayne plays Davy Crockett. The movie is incorrectly recalled as a box of fice disaster; in fact, it was the country’s third most popular film during its release. As for Yates, Big John had the last laugh. The Last Command cost $1 million to make but lost so much money that Republic was forced to shut down as a production company. ■