冷血霹雳火

- How does the film reveal the contradictions of Bertha's personality?
And why this complex figure decides to rob on the railroad?



The story is set during the Great Depression when Bertha is drifting around in America by the boxcars with her 'guts and luck'. She is pure like wild animal and ignorant like Eve before the serpent comes. When Bill taking her clothes off, Bertha becomes a little nervous but soon submissive and joyful. After then Bill leaves, Bertha finds money in her shoe. She looks at the money, pauses for one second, starts smiling. Her facial expression doesn't show a tiny bit of humiliation, embarrassment, disappointment or lost, but simply saying 'what a surprise. Sex is good, money is better!'


When Bertha is with her client at the whorehouse, she acts in an open, almost motherly way during the conversation. Then there's a shot from the back of the man touching her face. It is accurately framed that we can only see Bertha's one eye, and the expression in it looks like smoothy, creamy chocolate milk. Years after Bertha discovers that Bill has came out from jail, she again displays pure happiness, never worried about whether Bill's going to despise her for being a prostitute (and he truly won't). 
On the other hand, Bertha sometimes shows incredibly streetwise as oppose to an innocent animal-like country girl. Before Rake and Bertha go for gambling, Bertha sees Rake puts a gun into his pocket. She says something like 'you gotta watch out' in an intriguing way. Later when Rake is caught cheating in the game, she falls into his arms to cover him; then a close-up shows she takes out the money and the gun from his pocket; she quickly stands up like she's being pushed away, then 'accidentally' shoot the guy who is fighting with Rake and has just made lewd comments about her figure.


Another moment that shows Bertha's socialized side is when she arrived the whorehouse and realizes that it is a whorehouse, she turns around to the front door, looks like she's leaving. Then she turns back with a dull smile, decides to stay. To me this shot looks like she's compromising giving the current circumstances; she is making a very adult, rational choice rather than lead by Bill or her natural instinct.

Steve Baumgartner mentioned that Bertha join up with Bill because "...she saw injustice being done to the working class from the people that employ them and wanted to fight against it." While in my opinion this plot sets out just to give us a reason to feel empathy for her, thereby find the violence interesting and reasonable. It is the reason for the audience, not the reason of her robbing on railroads.


Why she's doing so? Before met with Bill, Bertha was Boxcar Bertha living the life of a transient. Then she sees Big Bill giving out a passionate socialist speech. She stands in the crowd, very exciting, laughs and claps, repeats his word and obviously without knowing its meaning. She puts a gun into the cop's mouth not because the police and authority represent capitalism that she wants to rebel against, but because she wants to rescue her lover. When Bill gets frustrated, she offers him to quit and go away, anything he wants. I agree with Adam's thought that 'there is a symbolic tie between the death of Bertha's father and her lover Bill.' After Bill dies, Bertha becomes a follower wanders around just like before.



- What's the Anagogical meaning of this film?



There is a very clear Catholic metaphor in Boxcar Bertha. Bill was made into a Jesus figure with three followers- a woman (Magdalene), a black man and a Jew. According to Vincent LoBrutto, 'the bible-quoting Sartoris becomes sort of a God-the-Father presence to Bill's God-the-Son persona, and these symbols are heightened, since the characters are played by actors who are actually father and son.'


It is also saying that during filming of Boxcar Bertha, Hershey gave Scorsese her copy of a book called The Last Temptation. More than a decade later he directed a film adaptation of the book, with Hershey as Mary Magdalene. While her role in Boxcar Bertha seems like a precursor for the character of Magdalene in The Last Temptation of Christ. 
But actually I didn't pay much attention on the Anagogical aspect during watching this film. It might tried too hard to imply religious metaphor thereby was less fun to me. 


source: Google Books- The Passion of Martin Scorsese: A Critical Study of the Films By Annette Wernblad; Martin Scorsese: A Biography by Vincent LoBrutto

每次去鎮宇的時候都很頭大爲何百分之九十以上都是悶死人不償命的歐洲片，當然也有南美澳州中東片，不過那也不是我的style。問標準中年文青老板，他往往愛莫能助的一笑，然後意味深長的說美國片啊。。。所以居然找到了一張《冷血霹靂火》，實在是幸甚志哉。

冷血霹靂火這個名字無比瓜三，原名是Boxcar Bertha，车厢貝莎，也就是片中女主角的名字（她既不冷血也不霹靂，男主角是個在某個方面道德感很強的怪人，當然也不是冷血的霹靂。嘛，大概這是形容那一幫警察的）。封套上的介紹也十分狗血，說一個男偵探和三個女人的糾葛，但實際上是一個女人和三個男人的旅程，除了不停的搶奪和逃亡，和桃色事件根本就扯不上關係。隱性三角雖然還是存在的。馬丁斯科塞斯早年賣座電影之一，還是比較斯克塞斯風格。色彩/敍事張力，甚至於他挑演員的喜好和後來一脈相承。

看的時候會和67年那部所謂開創新古典好萊塢電影的黑色電影邦尼與克萊德比較。不過個人感覺《邦尼》是冷靜幽默底下黑色潛流，而《冷血》幾乎就是黑色的。《邦尼》在小地方還會讓人莞爾一笑，《冷血》就是一黑到底。片尾男主角比爾被以耶穌受難的形式釘死在他無比厭惡的火車車廂外，在伯莎絕望的追逐中漸行漸遠，震撼大約也不遜于安靜無聲沒有預料的邦尼與克萊德被亂槍打死的結尾。所謂終局已然，塵埃落定吧。

比爾是一個警察口中的布爾什維克主義者。伯莎第一次看見他的時候，他正在露天演講，控訴對黑人的歧視和火車對當地人民的利益損害（如有事實出入，怪我英文辨識能力不夠）。後來入獄被折磨也是因爲只有他和黑人獄友言笑晏晏。就算他半推半就參與到伯莎興致勃勃地沿途搶劫，也絕對不傷人，他甚至情緒激動的對伯莎讓他用槍大聲抗議說我絕對不儅一個criminal。四人中，沒有用槍傷人的也只有他。這種古怪而悲哀的道德潔癖最後也導致了他的死亡。

克萊德某种程度上由一個有案底的人變成讓人聞風色變的持槍搶劫者，實在也是官逼民反？（哈，當然不是。）他不是十惡不赦之徒。比如在搶銀行的時候他會留下顧客自己的血汗錢。一開始的傷人，實在也是情非所願，在上車後他會像個小孩子一樣以受委屈的口吻對邦尼說我根本不想傷他的，他爲什麽要殺我。把錢給我就好了。不過後來毫不手軟的開槍，是因爲一回生二回熟麽？爆。

當然這樣的故事，就算一開始日日春風好，到最後總歸要回到天網恢恢疏而不漏的路上來。（不要說瑞普裏是如何逍遙法外，史派西在將警察耍弄一通如何大搖大擺走出警局，因爲那還只是小惡。搶銀行殺人這種罪行最後還能亡命鴛鴦生活在一起的，既不符合實際情況，也不能滿足電影教育人民大衆的意義哈）大部分情況下，我都心安理得的接受，出來混始終要還的。少數看得難過，希望他們能逃脫的，也就只有日落跳舞和雌雄大盜了。