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(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
By Alan Silverman
Hollywood
21 September 2009
Matt Damon stars as Mark Whitacre in the offbeat1 comedy 'The Informant!
Director Steven Soderbergh dips into the "truth can be stranger than fiction" files for a fact-based farce2 about a financial scandal that rocked an American agriculture conglomerate3 in the 1990s.
In the mid-1990s, Mark Whitacre, a top executive at ADM - Archer-Daniels-Midland - became a 'whistle-blower,' informing the FBI about alleged4 criminal activities by the giant agri-business corporation.
The amino acid lysine, derived5 from crops like soybeans, is widely used in agriculture to help boost livestock6 production. If multi-national corporations were conspiring7 to fix the price of the chemical, it could increase the cost of food around the world; and it would be against the law. The probe launched by Whitacre's allegations uncovered massive fraud that led to the company paying a $100 million fine 10 years ago: to that time, the largest such anti-trust penalty in U.S. history. But along the way, questions popped up about the reliability8 of the inside source.
One moment Whitacre is the hero; then he is the subject of another investigation9, accused of embezzling10 millions of dollars from his employer. The often-bizarre true story was detailed11 in a best-selling book that caught the eye of filmmaker Steven Soderbergh, who says "My sense was he would be this guy whether he was working at ADM or not, so I never looked at as a movie about corrupt12 corporations. I really was just thinking about Whitacre."
Oscar-winner Soderbergh tackled the topic of corporate13 wrongdoing in his 2000 drama "Erin Brockovich;" but he says the Mark Whitacre story just naturally lent itself to a comic treatment.
"I'm becoming more and more convinced that a good movie idea is rooted more in a character than a subject and there were so many times in the book when the 'shoe would drop' and you would just gasp14 and have to reframe everything that you knew up that point. That's a really good situation to build a movie around. That's what I liked about it: unlike most films where you have external forces acting15 upon your protagonist16, the external forces acting on the protagonist were all generated by the protagonist. So it was a really fascinating situation. He's the good guy and the bad guy at the same time. That was another reason we started thinking in terms of the comedy," he says.
Screenwriter Scott Z. Burns adapted the book by New York Times reporter Kurt Eichenwald for "The Informant!" script.
"The amazing thing that happened …a sort of 'perfect storm' of events …is a person who constitutionally can't really tell the truth is sent in by a truth-seeking organization to explore a big corporation that is lying. That in itself is pretty comic," he says.
Matt Damon, whose roles include the sinewy17 secret agent of the 'Jason Bourne' movies, packed on more than 15 kilos of weight to play "The Informant." He studied the books and news coverage18 about the true story, but Damon says he decided19 not to meet the real Whitacre before portraying20 the film version.
"Once Steven made the decision to take it in a more comic direction tonally, for all of us it became less important to do rigorous character studies of the actual people. It became more about having fun with this terrific script. All the answers we needed were in the actual text, like when you do a play," he says.
A basic dilemma21, however, is whether audiences see Whitacre as the selfless hero or the self-serving villain22. Director and producer Soderbergh says 'why not both?'
"As I get older I realize that two opposing ideas can actually both be true. I think he was a hero. To my knowledge it is still the biggest case of its kind that has ever been prosecuted23 in the United States. He also embezzled24 money. So it is one of those weird25 things. I had no interest in judging him. I just wanted to lay it out there and let people have their own reaction to it. I didn't think he was worthy26 of condemnation27, but it is also obvious that he had a very complicated relationship with the truth," he says.
"The Informant!" also features New Zealand-born character actress Melanie Lynskey as spouse28 Ginger29 Whitacre. Scott Bakula and Joel McHale play the FBI agents trying to discover the truth inside Mark Whitacre's increasingly strange tales. A jaunty30 score from Oscar-winning composer Marvin Hamlisch punctuates31 the comedy.
1 offbeat | |
adj.不平常的,离奇的 | |
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2 farce | |
n.闹剧,笑剧,滑稽戏;胡闹 | |
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3 conglomerate | |
n.综合商社,多元化集团公司 | |
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4 alleged | |
a.被指控的,嫌疑的 | |
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5 derived | |
vi.起源;由来;衍生;导出v.得到( derive的过去式和过去分词 );(从…中)得到获得;源于;(从…中)提取 | |
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6 livestock | |
n.家畜,牲畜 | |
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7 conspiring | |
密谋( conspire的现在分词 ); 搞阴谋; (事件等)巧合; 共同导致 | |
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8 reliability | |
n.可靠性,确实性 | |
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9 investigation | |
n.调查,调查研究 | |
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10 embezzling | |
v.贪污,盗用(公款)( embezzle的现在分词 ) | |
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11 detailed | |
adj.详细的,详尽的,极注意细节的,完全的 | |
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12 corrupt | |
v.贿赂,收买;adj.腐败的,贪污的 | |
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13 corporate | |
adj.共同的,全体的;公司的,企业的 | |
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14 gasp | |
n.喘息,气喘;v.喘息;气吁吁他说 | |
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15 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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16 protagonist | |
n.(思想观念的)倡导者;主角,主人公 | |
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17 sinewy | |
adj.多腱的,强壮有力的 | |
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18 coverage | |
n.报导,保险范围,保险额,范围,覆盖 | |
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19 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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20 portraying | |
v.画像( portray的现在分词 );描述;描绘;描画 | |
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21 dilemma | |
n.困境,进退两难的局面 | |
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22 villain | |
n.反派演员,反面人物;恶棍;问题的起因 | |
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23 prosecuted | |
a.被起诉的 | |
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24 embezzled | |
v.贪污,盗用(公款)( embezzle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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25 weird | |
adj.古怪的,离奇的;怪诞的,神秘而可怕的 | |
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26 worthy | |
adj.(of)值得的,配得上的;有价值的 | |
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27 condemnation | |
n.谴责; 定罪 | |
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28 spouse | |
n.配偶(指夫或妻) | |
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29 ginger | |
n.姜,精力,淡赤黄色;adj.淡赤黄色的;vt.使活泼,使有生气 | |
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30 jaunty | |
adj.愉快的,满足的;adv.心满意足地,洋洋得意地;n.心满意足;洋洋得意 | |
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31 punctuates | |
v.(在文字中)加标点符号,加标点( punctuate的第三人称单数 );不时打断某事物 | |
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