Shanjhey Kumar Perumal

餘音不絕的吶喊：與《惡道》導演對談

文／雷智宇

譯／黃雋浩


在二月一個空氣潮濕、暮色瀰漫的黃昏，我們來到了中山大樓，這個新興的吉隆坡文化地景交匯之地。走過藝術檔案館和絲印工作室，來到了一個獨立藝文空間「亞答屋84號圖書館」進行是次採訪。在書籍層層堆疊的書架下，我和電影《惡道》（Jagat）導演山杰・古瑪・培魯瑪（Shanjhey Kumar Perumal）展開對談。 「您是在怎樣的背景下長大的？從電影、文學到音樂，在這些文化交融下如何形塑出您的電影製作實踐？」 縱然提問是那麼兀突，山杰還是以反映自身生命的字句恰到好處地作出回應。

就在我們對談期間，勾起了山杰零碎的回憶片段。他告訴我們他從前住在一個華人新村，也是唯一一個表演Ulek Mayang——一種來自馬來半島登嘉樓州傳統馬來舞蹈——的印裔表演者，這令他備受可能改信伊斯蘭教的質疑。同時，也因頗具世界性的美食經驗，他享用伴著馬來式肉鬆serunding（一種牛肉，魚肉或雞肉鬆）的南印度亞參飯（nasi asam）。而在他的心目中，這些成長在上世紀70年代中期的人，是在所謂國族塑造過程的夾縫一代，未直接受國家意識形態影響。

全球化以「文化消費的方式」把我們吞沒。「我們見證著衛星電視頻道如ASTRO，如何影響我們看待自己的方式，而當中有近11個來自印度的頻道，影響著我們消費什麼。而事實上，我們的上一代也有著類同的經驗，他們讀到的政治新聞，也是印度的多於馬來西亞的。」山杰不無調侃地說道，「順理成章，我們正正是被夾在中間的一代人！」


超越政治邊界

山杰憶述，自己來自一個工人家庭，童年接觸到許多來自好萊塢、香港，以至南印度泰米爾語的康萊塢（Kollywood）的流行文化電影。 雖然有好一段時間，他也迷上了泰盧固（Telegu）電影和馬拉雅拉姆（Malayalam ）電影，但當時能真正觸動到他的，只有中國導演張藝謀執導的《紅高粱》（1988）。第一次接觸到該電影時，他還是個生活於馬來半島北部的一個9歲小孩，自此電影中的地理美學就深深吸引他。

「因為《紅高粱》中的山河，我感受到與電影的連結，但與我有共同的語言和文化的泰米爾電影，我反而沒有找到這種連結。 」「這裡（馬來西亞）是一片熱帶雨林，它是島嶼之間的馬來世界（Nusantara）。 兩百年前我的祖先來到這裡，而我就是在這裡落戶的第三代，對於這片山河有著更緊密的連結。」如是者，在電影拍攝上，這一切啟發出山杰拍成這部突破性電影《惡道》（2015）。該片精采捕捉了上世紀80年代馬來西亞印裔所面對的殘酷而惡性的焦慮。

對山杰來說，「縱然是艱苦地活著」，但正是他所棲身的那片山河的「景色與氛圍啟發出藝術家的創作」，並超脫「人類所創造的政治邊界」。他強調在他導演《惡道》時，「只是想講述他的成長故事」，而從沒有意識要將「《惡道》拍成泰米爾離散電影抑或馬來西亞電影」。

然而，第28屆馬來西亞電影節期間所發生的事情卻令他十分錯愕。主辦單位引入了兩個荒謬的分類，將所有電影分為「國語電影」和「非國語電影」， 只有滿足70％馬來語對白要求的電影，才能角逐最佳電影、最佳導演和最佳劇本獎。後來在巨大反彈和抗議下，這個安排才被推翻。雖然《惡道》最終被評為最佳馬來西亞電影，但這過程卻揭露了在語言多元的後殖民馬來西亞中，奉行單語制國策的深層脆弱，當中不僅關乎文化生產本身的問題，還牽涉國家建構的霸權邏輯。


與國語的複雜感情

這齣鬧劇並沒有嚇到山杰，反而讓他堅持信念。「我總是對人說我早與馬來語成親，不過後來又愛上了電影語言。 雖然這是一次外遇，但我希望是兩全其美。 我認為電影語言更勝實際語言，前者非但沒有邊界所言，有時甚至根本不需要任何語言，如是者，為什麼語言仍會在電影之中成為我們的問題？」 他續論，「這並非意味我不尊重民族語言，但我們要知道我們在談論的對象是電影本身。 而無不諷刺的是，當年所有競逐最佳馬來西亞電影的馬來電影都以英文作片名，而我的電影卻是以馬來俚語寫成......」。的確，《惡道》的片名Jagat正正是來自馬來語單詞「惡」（jahat）的泰米爾俚語。

儘管如此，這些紛擾並未讓山杰意志消沉，他相信人一旦「跟故事坦誠相對」，就會不惜放下各種讓人執著的個性、風格、意識形態和道理。 不僅如此，「故事將會決定並引領出其真實」，而終歸成為「真實的一部分」。 然而，如何透過電影經驗探索再現的真實與現實？ 到底我們所嘗試捕捉的真實，在素人演員哈維．拉芝（Harvind Raj）飾演的12歲Appoy的演出下又能帶來什麼？

山杰意識到，電影工業「作為一種逃避主義」，「我根本無法從中找出真實」，因為「它們並不代表作為工人階級，以至屬於大多數印度人的我」。然而，這種矛盾驅使山杰看出將這個故事帶入主流的迫切性。對於山杰，《惡道》的劇本書寫是一個療癒的過程，它原初本是一部黑色喜劇，但後來喜劇和悲劇也縱橫交錯地展開，而電影中男孩代表著「未來一代是整齣戲的受害者」。Appoy正正是山杰自己「為了了解真實所化身的孩子」。而那個真實正是帶來水火不容的矛盾、不協調的主體，那個周旋於馬來西亞人、印度人、馬來西亞印度人或印度裔馬來西亞人之間的永恆他者身份。Appoy疾聲吶喊的那一場戲將會是未來大家侃侃而谈的經典馬來西亞電影之作，然而，這或許是Appoy唯一一次真正發出的求救吶喊。而現實中，我們作為一個社會集體，卻至今一直選擇對Appoy困境袖手旁觀。


*本訪談係為2019交通大學「焦慮的年代：馬來西亞影展在台灣」放映計劃進行並整理成章，原載於《放映週報》，第643期，2019/04/15。

Jagat and its etcetera: A Conversation with the Director

/ Zikri Rahman


The air was damp, with February dusk filling in the Zhongshan building – a site where emerging Kuala Lumpur cultural scenes intertwine. From an archival center to a silk-screen printing group and we were there hosted by the independent space, Rumah Attap Library and Collective for the interview. Layers of books on the shelves and that was how I initiated the conversation with the film auteur, Shanjhey Kumar Perumal. “How was it like growing up? What are the cultural confluences; films, literature, music that shape your practice as a filmmaker?” – indeed it was such an abrupt question but he speaks in measured sentences reflecting on his own life.

It was his fragments of memories that then transpire along our conversation; living in a squatter area in a Chinese village, of being the only Indian performing Ulek Mayang (a ritualistic and classical Malay dance from Terengganu, a state in Peninsular Malaysia) that triggered the question of possible religious conversion to Islam. Growing up to cosmopolitan gastronomical experience of eating southern Indian’s nasi asam with serunding (beef, fish or chicken floss), and yet he still feels that those who grew up in the mid-70’s as “the generation in between; who are not really affected, being shaped by what we called the nation-building process”.

Globalisation engulfs us “in terms of the cultural consumption; we have seen how satellite channel providers like ASTRO influence the way we see ourselves; we have almost eleven channels from India hence influencing what we consume. It happened before to my previous generation too where we can observe that they read more political news from India instead of from Malaysia.” As a consequence, “we are the generation that is stuck in between!” quipped Shanjhey.


Beyond political boundaries

Shanjhey recalls, coming from a working-class family, he grew up being exposed to a lot of popular culture films, be it from Hollywood, Hong Kong to Kollywood movies from India. Once in a while, it will be Telegu and Malayalam films but nothing really moves him like Zhang Yimou’s Red Sorghum (1988) where the geographical aesthetics captivated his first encounter of the film as a nine-year-old living in northern part of Peninsular Malaysia.

“I feel connected to the movie (Red Sorghum) because of the geography”, and instead, it is “not with the Tamil films though I am sharing the same language and same culture” that touched him. “This (Malaysia) is a rainforest” and “it is so Nusantara. I am the third generation; my ancestors came here like two hundred years ago – I am more attached to the geography here”. Hence cinematographically, the geography inspires Jagat (2015), Shanjhey’s breakthrough film that beautifully captures the brutal vicious anxieties of the Malaysian Indians living in the 1980s.

For Shanjhey, “though the life is hard”, it is the geography, “the scenery and the environment” that “inspired the artist to come out with the creation” and to go beyond the “political borders created by man”. It is of no coincidence that when he directed Jagat, he stressed that he “just want to tell the story that I grew up with” and he does not have a consciousness to see “Jagat as a diasporic Tamil film or whether it is a Malaysian film”.

What transpired during the 28th Malaysian Film Festival baffled him, as the award organizer committee introduced two absurd categorizations where all the films being contested were then being divided to “Malaysian-language films” and “Non-Malaysian language films”. Only those films which meet 70% Malaysian-language requirement are then allowed to compete for the Best Film, Best Director and Best Screenplay but the decision was later overturned after a huge backlash and protest. Jagat was declared as the Best Malaysian Film but not without exposing the deep fragility of a monoglot state in polyglot postcolonial Malaysia pertaining not only the questions of cultural production per se, but also how hegemonic is the logic of national construction.


A love affair with the language

This incidence does not deter Shanjhey, rather it gave him conviction where, “I always said that I am married to the Malay language but then, I fell in love with the film language. I need both, it is an affair. Film language prevails more than the actual language, there is no boundary at all for the film language, and sometimes it doesn’t need any language at all. Why should we have language issues inside a film?” Continuing his argument, “it doesn’t mean I disrespect the national language but we are talking about films. The irony is that all the Malay-language films that contested in that particular year were all using English titles whereby my film is titled in colloquial Malay language…”Interestingly, “jagat” is a Tamil slang word for the Malay word “bad”.

The brouhaha doesn’t appear to have dampened his spirit as he believes that once one being “honest with the story”, it will absolve everything – the character, the style, ideology, and the philosophy. Not only that, “the story will determine and let it to the truth” and ultimately, it will “belong to truth”. What is there to explore the truth of representation and the reality through cinematic experiences? How is it like working with the 12-year-old Appoy – starring Harvind Raj – as a non-actor influencing the truth that we try to capture?

The film industry, he observes, “works as an escapism” where “I can’t find the truth at all” as “they are not representing myself - the working class people and the majority of the Indian people”. The conflicts do not end there as he sees the urgency to bring this story so that it can be mainstream. It is a healing process for Shanjhey writing the script where Jagat was supposedly a black comedy. But comedy and tragedy have become intricately weaved to each other where “the future generation is the victim of the entire drama” – the boy Appoy. Appoy is Shanjhey himself “being a kid in order to understand the truth”. The truth is the warring contradictory and unreconciled subjectivized bodies of being a Malaysian, an Indian, a Malaysian-Indian or Indian-Malaysian – the eternal Others. It might be the only distress call of truth that Appoy has ever made – the scene will remain a classic in Malaysian cinema for years to come– and we, collectively as a society, chose to hang up on him.

* This interview is conducted for the “Age of Anxiety: Malaysian Film Festival in Taiwan”, and has been published on Funscreen Issue No. 643 on Apr 15, 2019.