大八卦

　　东北小镇，白事先生张英豪和卖狐皮的王元顺意气相投。但背地里王元顺却与张英豪的媳妇李文红有染。李文红怀上了王元顺的孩子，王元顺决定杀死张英豪。然而他雇佣来的杀手竟屡屡失手。王元顺杀人不成反被杀手讹钱。无奈之下，他开始挑拨杀手们的关系……一年后，一具尸体惊现废井。警方确定王元顺有重大作案嫌疑。可王元顺却已离奇失踪，仿佛人间蒸发……

　　小青年汤姆（伊恩·德·卡斯泰克 Iain De Caestecker 饰）致电有过一面之缘的女孩露西（爱丽丝·恩格勒特 Alice Englert 饰），邀请对方参加即将在爱尔兰举行的音乐节。汤姆处心积虑规划行程，比音乐节预定提前一天到达目的地。他约女孩去网上预订的基拉尼旅店留宿。笔直的公路无限延伸至远方，四周但见无垠旷野，阴冷荒凉，几乎看不到一个人影。汽车在无聊和枯燥中行驶，天色慢慢暗了下来，而他们却迷失方向，始终找不到目的地。随着暮色降临，恐慌在彼此心底升起，他们在迷宫一般的丛林里失去方向，曾经轻浮暧昧的笑容不在。　　在漆黑旷野，一名满脸是血的男子突然出现在汤姆和露西面前。原本设想中美好的约会，注定变成万劫不复的噩梦……

该片基于Tilar J. Mazzeo所著小说《The Widow Clicquot: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It》，讲述19世纪法国凯歌酒庄早年的坚韧发家历程，将这个标志性橙色品牌背后的迷人年轻女子形象栩栩如生地展现出来。                                                                      　　凯歌香槟1772年由商人菲利普·克里科创立，其子弗朗索瓦·克里科与商业大亨尼古拉斯·庞萨丁的女儿芭比·妮可·庞萨丁结婚后，夫妻俩逐渐接手酒厂，一同发展香槟事业。七年后，弗朗索瓦在30岁时因伤寒突然去世，震惊的菲利普打算清算公司，27岁的芭比决定接管丈夫的生意，成为19世纪初期在男性主导的世界中经营国际企业的首批商业女性之一。在当时的法国，寡妇是唯一不需要经过丈夫或父亲的同意进行工作、读书的女性。                                                                      　　因为战争，酒业一度摇摇欲坠，公司面临破产，芭比通过将香槟出口到俄罗斯力挽狂澜，拿破仑战争期间，凯歌香槟在整个欧洲的皇室宫廷取得了大幅进展，将其确立为整个欧洲上流社会和贵族青睐的饮品方面发挥了重要作用。

　　Set in an underground dungeon inhabited by bundled, ragged human beings, after the nuclear holocaust. The story follows the wanderings of a hero through the situations of survival. People wait for the Ark to arrive and rescue them while their habitat falls apart.　　Delving deep into the dusty and long abandonded vaults of b-cinema in search of lost gems always leaves me with a bittersweet taste. On one hand the discovery of unexpected gems where no one would think them possible is a rewarding experience. On the other hand though it makes one wonder how many of these remarkable low-budget oddities, personal love affairs of directors never quite famous and now all but forgotten, have almost forever slipped from memory?　　n any case what we have here is a little post-apocalyptic gem from Poland that is really better than it has any right to. The dystopian near future of O-BI, O-BA finds a group of survivors of the nuclear war that ravaged the Earth inhabiting an underworld concrete bunker and biding their time as they wait for the mysterious Ark, an air ship of some kind that will come and save them. The Ark proves to be an elaborate hoax, carefully designed to give hope to the malnourished and desperate denizens of the bunker, while in the meantime the dome that separates their miserable existence from the nuclear winter outside is slowly caving in.　　What first striked me about the movie is the design of the bunker and the depiction of the survivors. The survivors are gaunt, filthy and terrible-looking penitents, dressed in rags and aimlessly wandering the neon-lit halls of the bunker like automatons. The bunker is a rundown, seedy place, with bright neon lights peering from all sides like the eyes of malignant beasts.　　On one hand it is a slightly 80's depiction of the dystopian future but the movie never stoops down to MAD MAX cheese. Instead it combines biting political satire with the bleak outlook of a world with no future, black comedy with barbs on apathy, religion and power. The survivors, for example, are fed some kind of flour dropping from a tube that hovers in the air - later on we discover the food supervisor uses books and the Bible itself as filler for this meagre meal. There are many such short symbolic touches, perhaps not life-changing or faith-restoring, yet playful, clever and inspired.　　One thing is for sure; O-BI, O-BA is not your run-of-the-mill sci-fi schlock. It overcomes its modest budget with creativity and has genuine artistic aspirations both from a writing and directing perspective. My opinion is that it should have been filmed in black and white instead of colour though. The director uses atmospheric light and shadow to great effect and it would have registered even better in stark black and white. The blue-green neon on the other hand outstays its welcome after a while. Just a minor gripe in an otherwise solid b-movie with its heart set in all the right places.　　Imagine a less bleak THE ROAD (Cormac McCarthy) being injected with the satire and humour of DR.STRANGELOVE and you're getting there. See it if you can find it.