贝奥武夫 第11期

Believed to have been written down in the 8th century, Beowulf tells the adventures of a heroic Scandinavian warrior who rises up to defend[防卫] his

Danish countrymen after their great hall is attacked by a

demon[恶魔] named Grendel. For such a fantastical[空想的] story, director Robert Zemeckis once again taps into[利用] the animation technique he used in The Polar Express ―

having real actors perform their roles, and then later

using computers to animate their characters over them.

Behind the Scenes: Roger Avary and Neil Gaiman Discuss Beowulf

Even if the Beowulf story isn’t your cup of tea, the visuals are so extraordinary the story itself comes across as secondary. While the performances are 100% the actors, the movie is entirely motion capture.

Working in that virtual[（电脑）虚拟的] world, certain physical

attributes[身体素质] of the actors can be enhanced[提高]. But Avary and Gaiman both pointed out that the technology took nothing away from the work done by the actors on the set.

Gaiman said the actors worked on the movie two years ago in Los Angeles, wearing suits with dots[圆点] on them. Gaiman admits he’s even been thinking about the possibility of Anthony Hopkins getting nominated as supporting actor for his role. It’s Hopkins’ voice, his facial movements, his entire performance, but the problem is it’s a motion capture film.

Asked how they came to be involved in Beowulf, Avary said he was hooked[沉迷] on the story after

having to read it in high school. “Monsters, dragons, guys with swords...What’s not to love?” After getting hired and then fired from Sandman, Avary was looking

for something to do, and Beowulf was a story he’d

always had a desire to tackle[抓住].

Hooking up[加入] with Gaiman, the two set off to Mexico to write the script[剧本]. Avary said they wrote the screenplay “very, very, very quickly.” Robert Zemeckis

came onboard as a producer and backed Avary to direct the movie. But later, Zemeckis became available to direct. And then the decision to go with motion capture and do it in 3-D changed Avary and Gaiman’s

approach[方法] to the script. Gaiman said that before deciding on the 3-D motion capture, “We had the cheapest possible dragon fight at the end.” Zemeckis told them to “write whatever you want,” and Avary and Gaiman took that advice to heart. They even thought they’d gone too far, but Zemeckis told them that no matter what they came up with, no matter how far they wanted to push the fight scenes, it would cost him about a million dollars per minute. On working with Zemeckis Avary said, “It was really, really a blessing for him to make this movie.”

人们一般认为《贝奥武夫》写于8世纪，讲述一位英勇的斯堪的纳维亚战士的历险故事。在圣殿被一只叫格兰戴的恶魔袭击后，这位战士奋起保卫他的丹麦同胞。对这样一个天马行空的故事，导演罗伯特・赞米基斯又一次利用之前在《极地特快》里运用的动画技术――让真演员演绎角色，然后用电脑将这些角色动画化。

幕后直击：罗杰・艾弗瑞和尼尔・盖曼谈论《贝奥武夫》的制作

即使贝奥武夫的故事不合你的口味，这部电影的视觉效果实在是太出色了，以致故事本身的情节退居二位。（在片中）进行表演的都是百分百的真人演员，但整部电影却是动作捕捉技术的成果。在那样一个电脑虚拟的世界里，演员的某些身体素质可以被大大提高。然而艾弗瑞和盖曼都指出，这种技术并不会抢走演员在片场的工作。

盖曼说演员们两年前在洛杉矶为这部电影工作，他们都要穿上布满圆点的衣服。盖曼承认他甚至曾经想过安东

尼・霍普金斯因出演他的角色获最佳男配角奖提名的可能性。那是霍普金斯的声音，他的面部表情，他的全部表演，但问题在于这是一部动作捕捉电影。

当被问到他们是如何参与到《贝奥武夫》的制作中时，艾弗瑞说他在高中被迫读完这个故事的时候就被迷住了。“怪物、龙、剑客……能不爱它吗？”那时艾弗瑞受聘于《沙人》，后来又被解雇了，需要找些活儿干，而《贝奥武夫》是他一直不想放过的故事。

（艾弗瑞）搭上盖曼，两人动身去了墨西哥写剧本。艾弗瑞说他们“相当、相当、相当快”地写好剧本。后来罗伯

特・赞米基斯当了制片人，并全力支持艾弗瑞当导演，而随后赞米基斯本人也有空档执导这部电影。当决定运用动作捕捉和3D技术制作电影后，艾弗瑞和盖曼写剧本的方法也随之改变。盖曼说在决定运用3D动作捕捉技术之前，“我们写的结局是最省钱的巨龙大战。”赞米基斯对他们说：“你们想写什么就写什么。”艾弗瑞和盖曼就把那个建议记在心里了。他们有时甚至觉得自己写过头了，但赞米基斯告诉他们无论他们想到什么，希望用什么来加强打斗场面，每一分钟镜头的制作都将花掉约一百万美元。在谈到和赞米基斯共事时，艾弗瑞说：“能让他参与这部电影的制作，我们实在是太幸运了。”