Gregory Peck：The American as Noble Man
When he died Gregory Peck took movie idealism with him.
The movie studio wanted Rock Hudson to play Atticus Finch.Fate decreed otherwise.Gregory Peck got the role of the small town Southern lawyer in the 1962film version of To Kill a Mockingbird.The hero of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer prize winning novel had been a man much like her father and when the author met the actor on the first day of shooting she noted“Gregory，youve got a little potbelly just like my daddy.”The star replied，“Harper，that’s great acting.”
Actuallyit was great inhabiting.“You never really understand a person...”Atticus says“until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”Tolerance ripening into empathythat was Peck’s gift in playing an elevated species of Americanthe man of strength and compassion.Today that species is more than endangeredit has nearly vanished.But it flourished for most of the actor’s halfcentury onscreenwhen Americans prided themselves on their fellow feeling for the downtrodden and their ability to uplift the races.Peck was liberal when liberal was cool.
From his early days as the most gorgeous man in pictures in Spellbound and Duel in the Sun to his long prime with a Mount Rushmore visage and the voice of Yahweh on a good dayPeck was the sonorous pitchman for movie humanism.He showed how a strong man could also be a gentle man.He counseled ethnic tol eranceof Jewsin Gentleman’s Agreementand blacksin Mockingbird.As a crusading attorney who is also a gentle single dad to his two young kidsPeck made rectitude appear robust.That sanctity had staying powerthe American Film Institute chose Atticus Finch as the top hero in U.S.movie history.
Peck wasn’t just an icon.He was an actora smart one.He picked hit properties in a wide variety of genresromantic comedy Roman Holiday action The Guns of Nararone horror The Omen .He was bold in taking roles—AhabGeneral MacArthur—that twisted his nobleman image.He assayed his share of misanthropes including Nazi monster Josef Mengele and western hombres as craggy as a butte.But Peck will be best remembered as the movies’exemplary father figurewho oftenand surprisinglyrevealed the pacifism at the heart of heroism.
Good exampleCape Fearwith Peck as the head of a family menaced by all time cunning sicko Robert Mitchum.At the climaxPeck trains a gun on the villain.Shoot himGregBut no.This time the good guy is not going to kill the bad guythe rotter will be triedconvicted and imprisoned.A less confident actor might have let this verdict sound like weaknessbut Peck sells the notion that life in jail is as unpleasant as a bullet in the gut.
Winners and losers are all too clearly defined in today’s movies.Peck’s best films always found thoughtful shades of gray.Atticus has taken on the case of a black man accused of raping a white woman—a perilous assignment in an Alabama town in the 1930s.He argues his case brilliantlydemolishes the oppositionconvinces each member of the movie audience...and loses.But Atticus has shown courage in the fight.As he leaves the courtroom in defeata black preacher attending the trial whispers a command to Atticus’6yearold daughter.“Miss Jean Louisestand up”he tells the girl.“Your father’s passing.”
Later in the filmPeck embodies a kind of pacifist resistance.The white woman’s racist father sees Peck with some blacks and spits in his face.Peckwith ferocious dignitytakes out a handkerchiefwipes off the insult and walks away—the victor by not fighting back.Good man to leadtough act to follow.
It’s dangerous to confuse an actor with his movie roles.But by all accounts the reel and the real Gregory Peck were close kin.He was a model of probitya loyal friend to colleagues in distressa father confessor to the Hollywood community.He chaired the National Society of Thisthe American Academy of That.He was laden with official honorsLyndon Johnson gave him the Presidential Medal of FreedomRichard Nixon put him on his Enemies List.Peck received perhaps his sweetest laurel when the reclusive Leeon hearing of his deathsaid“Gregory Peck was a beautiful man.Atticus Finch gave him the opportunity to play himself.”
But who will play the Gregory Peck hero now that noble is for wimps and the best place to find integrity is in Webster’s？The masculine delicacy that Peck represented is gone from filmsno star has filled his mold.Movie actors don’t have the voice or posture or temperament for it.Maybe America can’t believe in it.
To cherish Peck is to admit nostalgia for an era when popular and political culture could champion humanist ideals without smirking.If our time were not so facetiousso often corruptthat time—and this man—would not seem so precious.
Americastand up.Gregory Peck has passed on.
格利高里·派克：
高尚的美国人
格利高里·派克逝世了，也带走了电影的理想主义。
制片厂打算让罗克·赫德森饰演阿提库斯·芬奇。可冥冥中却偏偏另有安排。格利高里·派克获得了那个角色，在1962年的影片《杀死一只知更鸟》中扮演南方小镇的律师。这是哈珀·李获普利策奖的小说中的主人公，非常像她的父亲；影片开拍的第一天，作者与演员相遇时，她说道：“格利高里，你恰好和我父亲一样有点大腹便便。”那明星回答说：“哈珀，那才是真正的表演。”
实际上，那是真正的进入角色。阿提库斯说：“在你爬进一个人的皮肤下，在他体内行走之前，你永远不会真正理解一个人……”宽容逐渐成熟而移情于角色之中：派克的才能是扮演一种高素质的美国人——有力量和同情心的人。今天，那个“物种”已不仅仅濒危了；它几乎灭迹了。但在这个演员半个世纪的影艺生涯中的大部分时间里，这个物种都很兴旺。当时的美国人为他们对受压迫者的同情和为自己提高人性素质的能力而自豪。派克是个开明的人，而当时开明是美德。
派克从早期影片（《爱德华医生》和《阳光下的决斗》）中的帅哥，到漫长的全盛期中，他那仿佛在晴空下的拉什莫尔石像的面孔和耶和华般的声音，都表现出他是宣扬电影人文主义的嘹亮歌手。他表明一个健壮的人也可以是一个温柔的人。他提倡种族宽容：在《君子协定》中宽容犹太人，在《杀死一只知更鸟》中宽容黑人。作为进行圣战的律师和两个年幼孩子的单身好父亲，派克使正义坚不可摧。神圣的正义是长存的：美国电影学院选出阿提库斯·芬奇为美国电影史上的头号主人公。
派克不仅仅是一个偶像。他是一个演员，一个聪明的演员。他在范围广泛的样式中选择了最受欢迎的那些：浪漫喜剧（《罗马假日》），动作片（《纳瓦隆大炮》），恐怖片（《预兆》）。他大胆扮演了扭曲了他的高尚形象的角色——亚哈、麦克阿瑟将军。他尝试过厌恶人类者（包括纳粹恶魔约瑟夫·门格勒）和像孤峰一样粗野的西部汉子等角色。但人们最清楚地记得的派克还是影片中典型的长者形象。他们常常出人意料地揭示了作为英雄主义核心的和平主义。
《恐怖角》就是很好的一个例子。剧中，派克是一家之长，全家人受到老谋深算、道德败坏的罗伯特·米彻姆的威胁。在影片的高潮，派克把枪口对准了这个恶棍。开枪打死他，格雷格！但他没有开枪。这一次好人不打算杀死坏人；坏人要被审判、定罪和监禁。缺乏自信心的演员也许会让这个决定听起来懦弱无力，但派克宣扬的是这样一个观点，即身陷囹圄与遭枪子儿一样是令人不愉快的事。
今天的影片中胜败泾渭分明。在派克的最佳影片中总能看到发人深省的灰色影子。阿提库斯接手了一桩黑人男子被控强奸白人女子的案子——这在20世纪30年代的亚拉巴马小镇乃是一项要命的差事。他辩护精彩，驳倒了对方，令影片的每一个观众心服口服……可他败诉了。但阿提库斯在战斗中表现出了勇气。当他败诉而离开法庭时，参加审判会的一个黑人牧师悄声对阿提库斯的6岁女儿说：“琼·路易丝小姐，起立。你父亲正从这里走过。”
