《美國狙擊手》和槍支文化

Things we can learn from “American Sniper”:

我們可以從《美國狙擊手》(American Sniper)中學到的東西：

You know the movie, right? It has not only been nominated for the Best Picture Oscar; it could wind up selling more tickets than the other seven nominees combined. Plus, it’s triggered a left-right controversy that makes the old dust-up over “Duck Dynasty” seem like a tiny cultural blip.

你知道這部電影，對吧？它不僅獲得了奧斯卡最佳影片提名，而且最終票房可能比其他七部提名影片加在一起都高。另外，它在左右兩派之間引發了很大爭議，令之前爲《鴨子王朝》(Duck Dynasty)打的那一仗相形見拙。

“American Sniper” tells the story of Chris Kyle, a real-life Iraq war veteran and sharpshooter. The film is certainly powerful, and it celebrates our Iraq veterans. But it also eulogizes the killing of Iraq insurgents, including children, and critics feel it ought to be put in the context of an invasion that didn’t need to happen in the first place.

《美國狙擊手》講述了克里斯·凱爾(Chris Kyle)的故事。他是一位現實生活中的神槍手，曾參加過伊拉克戰爭。這部電影無疑令人震撼，它頌揚了我們的伊拉克老兵，但也讚美了對包括兒童在內的伊拉克叛亂分子的殺戮。評論家認爲，它應該提供一個背景：這場入侵本來就是沒有必要發生的。

There’s been less conversation about the final scene in the movie, which shows the hero walking through his family home, where the kids are romping. He’s carrying a handgun, which he points at his wife Taya, playfully telling her to “drop them drawers.” Taya says she can see he’s finally getting over his war traumas and back to his old fun-loving self.

對於電影的最後一幕，大家討論得比較少。在這一幕中，主人公帶着一支手槍，穿過自己的家，孩子們正在嬉戲。他開玩笑地用手槍指着妻子塔亞(Taya)，說：“把衣服脫了。”塔亞說，她能看出來，他終於走出了戰爭創傷，恢復到以前那種愛玩愛鬧的狀態。

This is, by virtually any standard, insane behavior. Mike Huckabee, a big “American Sniper” fan, recently published a book called “God, Guns, Grits and Gravy,” which is so wildly opposed to any weapon regulation that Huckabee opens his chapter on modern education by complaining that public schools are anti-gun. Yet he also presents a list of universally accepted gun safety rules, many of which boil down to don’t point it at anybody as a joke.

以任何標準來看，這種行爲都極其愚蠢。邁克·赫卡比(Mike Huckabee)是《美國狙擊手》的鐵桿粉絲，最近出了一本書，名叫《上帝、槍支、砂礫和橫財》(God, Guns, Grits and Gravy)。該書猛烈抨擊各種形式的武器管制，在“現代教育”一章的開始，他抱怨了公立學校的反槍立場。然而，他也列出了一些公認的槍支安全準則，其中很多條都可以歸納爲：不能用槍指着任何人開玩笑。

“Yeah, but if you want to complain about the casual treatment of guns in movies, you don’t have to look very hard on any Friday night,” said Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut. Murphy hasn’t seen the movie, but he’s one of Congress’s leading advocates of gun-control regulation. It’s not the world’s most rewarding job. In recent years, his colleagues have not only refused to pass an extremely modest bill on background checks, they’ve failed to ban the sale of guns to people on the terrorism watch list.

“是啊，但如果你想抱怨電影裏對槍支的草率處理，隨便哪個禮拜五晚上都可以輕易找到例子，”康涅狄格州參議員克里斯·墨菲(Chris Murphy)說。墨菲還沒看這部電影，但他是國會首屈一指的控槍法規倡導者。這可不是一份招人喜歡的工作。近年來，他的同僚們不但拒絕通過一個極其不起眼的背景調查法案，連禁止向恐怖主義監控名單中的人出售槍支都做不到。

“American Sniper” is on one, supremely obvious level, a celebration of gun culture. But it’s also a cautionary tale. The real Chris Kyle was shot to death while the script was being written. He had volunteered to help a troubled veteran, Eddie Ray Routh, who had a history of violent behavior and was an apparent victim of post-traumatic stress. Kyle felt the best way to get him to relax was to take him to a shooting range. While they were there, Routh turned his gun on Kyle, and one of Kyle’s friends, killing them both.

一定程度上說，《美國狙擊手》在十分鮮明地歌頌槍支文化。但同時它又是個警世故事。真實世界裏的克里斯·凱爾是在劇本寫作期間被槍殺的。他主動去幫助陷入困境的艾迪·雷·勞思(Eddie Ray Routh)，一個有暴力行爲前科的退伍軍人，而且似乎受到創傷後應激障礙的困擾。凱爾認爲讓他放鬆下來的最佳辦法是帶他去射擊場。勞思在那裏將槍對準凱爾以及凱爾的一個朋友，殺死了二人。

“American Sniper” could actually be seen, at least in the final scene, as a good-gun, bad-gun message. The real Chris Kyle did enjoy walking around the house, twirling a pistol. His wife said that as the clouds lifted after his Iraq service, he would playfully point a gun at the television and pretend to shoot down the bad guys.

實際上可以說，《美國狙擊手》傳達了一種槍有好槍、壞槍的觀念，至少在最後一場戲中是這樣。克里斯·凱爾本人的確是那種在家裏擺弄着手槍走來走去的人。他的妻子說，隨着從伊拉克戰場歸來後的陰霾散去，他有時會開玩笑地拿槍指着電視，假裝擊斃裏面的壞人。

Jason Hall, who wrote the movie screenplay, said the scene was meant to both show Kyle in recovery and presage the violence that was about to occur off-screen.

影片編劇傑森·霍爾(Jason Hall)說，安排這樣一個場景是爲了說明凱爾在復原中，同時也預示了即將在畫外發生的暴力。

“There’s a tension in the scene that builds toward the ending,” he said in a phone interview.

“這場戲有一種張力，一直積聚到結尾，”他在一次電話採訪中說。

The American gun lobby has pushed its cause so far that it, too, may be falling off a cliff. Texas, where Chris Kyle’s alleged murderer is going on trial next week, has always had a gun-friendly culture, so much so that visitors can bring concealed handguns into the State Capitol. Some people definitely do not think this goes far enough, and, on opening day of the Legislature last month, they demanded new laws making it legal to carry handguns in the open, preferably without a license.

美國的槍支遊說事業在推動其目標時不遺餘力，簡直已經到了懸崖邊緣。在德克薩斯，也就是被控謀殺克里斯·凱爾的嫌疑人下週上庭的地方，一直都有一種奉槍文化，對槍的態度友好到前往州議會的人可以隱蔽攜帶手槍。顯然有人覺得這還不夠，他們在上月的議會開放日上要求通過新的法律，讓他們可以合法公開攜帶手槍，最好是不用持槍證。

One particularly bouncy group, Open Carry Tarrant County, flooded the office of Representative Poncho Nevárez, a non-supportive Democrat. A video of the ensuing scene showed Nevárez, looking extremely wary, asking the demonstrators to leave his office, while one of them yelled back: “I’m asking you to leave my state.” When Nevárez tried to close his door, one of the protesters stuck his foot in it. This was all happening, remember, in a building where carrying concealed weapons is perfectly fine.

有個叫“塔蘭特縣公開攜槍”(Open Carry Tarrant County)的團體格外活躍，他們涌進了不支持該提案的衆議員龐喬·內瓦雷茲(Poncho Nevárez)的辦公室。在隨後拍攝的一段視頻中可以看到，神色極爲慌張的內瓦雷茲要求抗議者離開他的辦公室，而其中一個人喊道：“我要求你離開我的州。”內瓦雷茲試圖關門，卻被一名抗議者伸腳卡住。別忘了，這一切都發生在一個可以完全合法隱蔽攜帶武器的建築物裏。

When it was all over, some legislators in both parties wore “I’m Poncho” badges in solidarity with Nevárez, who was assigned a security detail after he and his family received threats.

事後來自兩黨的部分議員佩戴了“我是龐喬”的徽章，表達對內瓦雷茲的支持，他和家人在受到威脅後得到了專門的警衛保護。

The leader of Open Carry Tarrant County, Kory Watkins, then posted another video in which he claimed that the resistant lawmakers were forgetting their duty was “to protect the Constitution. And let me remind you: Going against the Constitution is treason. And treason is punishable by death.”

“塔蘭特縣公開攜槍”領導人科裏·瓦特金斯(Kory Watkins)隨後又上傳了一段視頻，聲稱和那些玩忽職守的議員對抗是“爲了保護憲法。我來提醒你們一下：和憲法背道而馳是叛國。叛國是要處死刑的。”

Meanwhile, in the Texas Capitol, enthusiasm for watering down the gun laws seems to be dwindling. That could qualify as a happy ending.

與此同時，在德州議會，放寬槍支法律限制的呼聲似乎在漸漸平息。這可以算作美滿結局了。