When Christian Bale was 13 he travelled to China to make his first film, Steven Spielberg's Empire of the Sun (1987). The adaptation of JG Ballard's book about life in Japan-occupied China during the second world war was shot in Shanghai. It's an experience the 37-year-old Bale now finds difficult to relate to. "It was so long ago," he says, sitting back in his seat in a Beverly Hills hotel. "I feel like it was a different person who made that movie."

克里斯蒂安•贝尔(Christian Bale)13岁时来到中国，出演自己演职生涯的首部影片，它就是由斯皮尔伯格(Steven Spielberg)执导的《太阳帝国》（Empire of the Sun，1987年）。这部由巴拉德(JG Ballard)作品改编的电影是在上海拍摄，讲述的是二战时日本占领下中国生活的往事。37岁的贝尔如今觉得很难与那段时光联系起来。这都是发生在很久以前的事了，他说，悠闲地坐在贝弗利山庄(Beverly Hills)某旅馆的座椅上。我仿佛觉得是另一个人出演这部电影。

Bale, born in Wales to English parents, has gone on to become one of Hollywood's most sought-after actors. His career includes challenging films such as American Psycho (2000) and The Machinist (2004), as well as an Oscar-winning performance in The Fighter (2010). Next summer he reprises the role of Batman in The Dark Knight Rises, the final instalment in Christopher Nolan's phenomenally successful trilogy. No grand strategy underpins the jobs he takes. Actors, he says, "don't really have the ability to plan everything they do".

出生在威尔士的贝尔（父母均为英格兰人）如今已经成为好莱坞的当红影星。他的作品包括精彩饰演《美国精神病人》（American Psycho, 2000年）、《机械师》（The Machinist, 2004年）以及奥斯卡获奖影片《斗士》（The Fighter, 2010年）。今年夏天，他将在《蝙蝠侠前传3：黑暗骑士崛起》(The Dark Knight Rises)中饰演蝙蝠侠(Batman)，这是克里斯托弗•诺兰(Christopher Nolan)所执导的大获成功的蝙蝠侠三部曲中的最后一部。导演的手笔再大也与他出演的角色没多大关系。他说，演员实在没有能力去谋划所做的一切。

With this in mind, there is something apt about his latest film, Zhang Yimou's The Flowers of War, in which Bale's career comes full circle. The production took the actor back to China for the first time since Empire of the Sun but this time the setting is Nanking in 1937. The flowers of the title are a group of women and girls who, aided by Bale's character, try to survive the brutal treatment of occupying Japanese soldiers.

他对此了然于心，加盟张艺谋(Zhang Yimou)的新片《金陵十三钗》(The Flowers of War)就是个明证。此次他又回到了自己演职生涯的起点处。这是他自出演《太阳帝国》后第一次回到中国，但这次故事的发生地是1937年的南京。片名中的十三钗指的是一群风尘女子与少女，她们在贝尔所饰演角色的帮助下，想方设法躲避日本占领军的兽行。

"It felt like fate calling Christian back to China," says Zhang. He and Bale are sitting in adjoining seats: Bale is wearing a dark open-necked shirt and jeans and has also grown a beard, like the one he sports at the beginning of the film when his character, an American mortician on the make, stumbles through the smoke in a ravaged Nanking to evade the Japanese. Zhang is all in black, pairing tracksuit trousers with a natty pair of Dr Martens-style boots; his daughter Mo sits between the two men and will translate for us today, as she did on the set.

似乎命运在召唤克里斯蒂安回到中国，张艺谋说。他与贝尔挨着坐：贝尔身穿黑色开领衫与牛仔裤，还长出了胡子，就象他在电影一开场所炫耀的那样，当时他饰演的角色（一位逐利的美国殡葬师）在战火蹂躏的南京城中磕磕绊绊地躲避着日本兵。张艺谋也一身黑装，下穿运动裤，脚穿一双马丁靴(Dr Martens-style boots)；他的女儿张末(Mo)坐在两人中间充当翻译，她在片场也是司职翻译。

Bale does not speak Mandarin and Zhang cannot speak English, so Mo was an essential presence during the shoot. The language gap did not stop the two from communicating, Bale explains, adding that he had a better experience than the last time he worked with a director who could not speak English (he declines to name the film), when the translator told me to do the exact opposite of what the director had said.

贝尔不会说汉语，而张艺谋又说不了英语，所以张末在片场的作用至关重要。但语言的隔阂并没有阻碍两人之间的沟通，贝尔解释道，并补充说这次的合作十分愉快，上次与一位不会说英语的导演合作时，翻译给我说的正好与导演的意图截然相反。

With Zhang, there was an immediate rapport. "You come to understand somebody, you see what they're like," says Bale. "You kind of get it. You can see expressions and body language and we were both laughing our arses off at the same thing — at least I hope it was the same thing." He laughs uproariously. "It was a real eye-opener in that I realised the communication doesn't have to be through the language. So it was very satisfactory creatively."

他与张艺谋很快就形成了默契。（在影片中）我慢慢理解其他角色，了解他们是一群什么样的人，贝尔说。我心里慢慢有谱了，看懂他们脸上的表情与肢体语言是啥意思。有时我们对同一件事都会笑得合不拢嘴——至少我相信指的是同一件事。他哈哈大笑。当我意识到相互之间不通过语言也能沟通时，真是大开眼界。所以看到此种‘创意’交流感觉很爽。

The prospect of working with Zhang drew him to the project. "He's a masterful storyteller," he says, acknowledging the reverence with which the director of Raise the Red Lantern (1991), Hero (2002) and House of Flying Daggers (2004) is held in China. Zhang also directed the spectacular opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics and had been set to work with an old friend — Steven Spielberg — until the American director pulled out as artistic adviser at the games in protest at China's failure to take a tougher stance against the unfolding humanitarian crisis in Darfur. At the time, Zhang described Spielberg's withdrawal as "very regrettable" but the two have apparently remained close: when Zhang began casting The Flowers of War, he consulted Spielberg, who immediately recommended Bale.

正是看到与张艺谋合作后的美好前景，贝尔才毫不犹豫地选择加盟。张艺谋是个了不起的讲故事高手，他说，也承认这位执导过《大红灯笼高高挂》（Raise the Red Lantern，1991年）、《英雄》（Hero，2002年）以及《十面埋伏》（House of Flying Daggers，2004年）的导演在中国举足轻重的地位。张艺谋还是2008年北京奥运会美轮美奂开幕式的总导演，原定与他的老朋友斯皮尔伯格联袂合作——但这位美国导演中途放弃了自己的艺术顾问职位，理由是抗议中国政府未能就苏丹达尔富尔地区(Darfur)愈演愈烈的人道灾难采取更为强硬的行动。当时，张艺谋称斯皮尔伯格的退出 十分遗憾，但很明显两位导演始终保持着亲密关系：当张艺谋开始执导《金陵十三钗》并向斯皮尔伯格讨教时，对方立即向他举荐了贝尔。

The film, shot in a mixture of English and Mandarin, received a limited release in the US at the end of last month to ensure it qualifies for the foreign film category in 2012's Academy Awards. It will be given a wider release in February and will also be screened at the Berlin Film Festival in February, when it should be picked up for distribution in European markets.

这部电影中英文夹杂，并于上月底在美国进行了小范围地放映，以确保先入围2012年奥斯卡(Academy Awards)外语片的评选。今年二月，该片将在更大范围内得以公映，并将于二月的柏林电影节(Berlin Film Festival)上放映，届时该片应该能获准在欧洲市场发行。

Zhang says the story, which gives a human face to one of China's worst tragedies — the Rape of Nanking, when an estimated 300,000 people were killed in six weeks — needed to be told and needed a foreign star. "It was very necessary to have a foreign actor in the movie. During that time there were [only] a handful of foreigners living in Nanking and they played a very important role in documenting what happened."

张艺谋说影片讲述的是中国历史上最惨绝人寰的悲剧——南京大屠杀(the Rape of Nanking)，在六周时间里，据估计有30万人遭到杀戮，影片需要有人来讲述这段故事，需要一位外国影星。这部影片亟需一位外国演员。大屠杀发生时，只有少数外国人居住在南京，他们对记录整个惨剧过程起到了关键作用。

The film was fully financed by a Chinese company, New Pictures Film — with support from two banks: Bank of China and Minsheng — but the presence of one of Hollywood's biggest stars is indicative of the close ties that have developed between the US film industry and China. Several US companies, including Legendary Entertainment, which co-financed Nolan's Batman films, have struck joint venture deals with Chinese-owned media groups to ensure their films qualify as Chinese-made productions, guaranteeing their distribution in the country. Currently, only a limited number of foreign films qualifies for official release in China because of a strict quota system, to the great frustration of Hollywood studios keen to tap one of the world's fastest-growing cinema markets.

这部电影的全部投资来自新画面影业公司(New Pictures Film)，此外还有两家中国的银行——中国银行(Bank of China)与民生银行(Minsheng)——的赞助，但好莱坞当红影星的加盟表明了美国与中国电影界之间关系密切。几家美国公司（包括传奇娱乐(Legendary Entertainment)，它是诺兰蝙蝠侠系列电影的共同出资方）都已与中国的媒体集团订立了合资协议，以确保自己的影片是中国制作，从而保证它们可以在中国市场发行。目前，由于中国严格的电影配额制度，只有为数不多的外国影片获批在中国正式发行，这让好莱坞的影视制作公司大失所望，因为它们强烈希望能打入这块全球发展最为迅猛的电影市场。

Breaking new ground in the relationship between Hollywood and China was of no interest to Bale. "I'm no businessman, so the whole question of whether this changes the business between Hollywood and China, which some people have mentioned to me: great, good luck. But it doesn’t have anything to do with me."

贝尔对开辟好莱坞与中国电影界关系的新局面不感兴趣。我不是商人，所以关于此举是否会改变中国与好莱坞之间的影视业务往来（很多人对我提起过），我只能说：这是件大好事，祝你们好运，但这与我毫无关系。

His next two projects will pair him with Terrence Malick, whose last film was The Tree of Life, while the end of the Batman trilogy is clearly a matter of some relief. "It was wonderful but there's a time when everything has to finish." I ask if he is tempted to make a fourth Batman film. "No. It's the right time to exit."

贝尔的下两部影片会与泰伦斯•马利克(Terrence Malick)合作，马立克的上一部影片是《生命之树》(The Tree of Life)，而拍完蝙蝠侠三部曲对贝尔来说无疑是种解脱。我度过了一段相当美妙的时光，但凡事总得有了断的时候。我问他是否有意再接拍第四部蝙蝠侠？他回答道，不，此时退出最为合适。

Given the scale of the movies he makes and the frequency with which he works, Bale is rare among his peers in that he has mostly succeeded in keeping his personal life separate from his professional work. Apart from an incident involving an argument with a family member before a premiere a few years ago, the notoriously intrusive UK tabloids have tended to leave him alone. "I try and stay under the radar and it's working, so I'm not going to ask any questions," he says. The less the audience knows about him, the more they will appreciate the characters he plays. You can have a pure enjoyment of the character because you know nothing about them. The less known about me, the better I can do what I do."

鉴于所拍影片的数量以及工作强度，贝尔成功做到了把自己的私生活与银幕生活隔绝开来，这在同行里较为罕见。除了几年前在某首映式前与家人争吵的一段小插曲外，英国臭名昭著、无孔不入的八卦小报往往不太去骚扰他。我设法做到不引人注目，而且成功地做到了这一点，所以我不会向你问任何问题，他说。观众对明星越不了解，就会越喜欢对方出演的角色。观众会从角色中得到纯粹的享受，因为压根不知道演员本人的情况。对我的了解越少，我就越能把角色演好。