It is not every year that Hollywood produces two movies about journalism that are Oscar contenders, but 2015 appears to have been that year. First came “Truth” in October. Based on the memoir of a former “60 Minutes” producer, Mary Mapes, it purports to tell the story of her gutsy 2004 investigation into George W. Bush’s service in the National Guard when he was a young man. When it turned out that her story, which was broadcast on “60 Minutes II” months before the president’s re-election, had unwittingly relied on falsified documents, the network suits turned against her and her famous correspondent, the CBS anchor Dan Rather, costing them their jobs.

好莱坞不是每年都能拍出两部参加奥斯卡角逐的关于新闻工作的电影，但是2015年似乎就出现了这种情况。先是10月份上映的《真相》(Truth)。它改编自《60分钟》(60 Minutes)前制作人玛丽·梅普斯(Mary Mapes)的回忆录，讲述她2004年勇敢调查乔治·W·布什(George W. Bush)年轻时在国民警卫队(National Guard)服役的情况。她的调查在《60分钟II》中播出。结果证明，她没有意识到自己依靠的是伪造的文件。CBS电视网的高层不再支持她，她和著名记者兼主播丹·拉瑟(Dan Rather)遭到解雇。数月后，布什再次当选。

“Truth” was followed in November by “Spotlight,” which goes inside The Boston Globe’s groundbreaking investigation into the pedophile priest scandal — and the shocking fact that child-molesting clerics were being protected by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston. (And, as we now know, by dioceses all across America and much of the rest of the world.) Starring Michael Keaton as Walter V. Robinson, known as Robby, the head of The Globe’s Spotlight investigative unit, the film is the most straightforward journalism procedural since “All the President’s Men.”

11月，《聚焦》(Spotlight)上映。它深入探讨《波士顿环球报》(The Boston Globe)对神父娈童丑闻的突破性调查。调查还令人震惊地发现，娈童神父受到罗马天主教波士顿大主教(Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston)辖区的保护（我们现在知道，实际上娈童教父在全美国乃至全世界各个辖区都得到保护）。迈克尔·基顿(Michael Keaton)饰演《波士顿环球报》聚焦调查组主管沃尔特·V·罗宾逊(Walter V. Robinson)，绰号罗比(Robby)。这部影片是继《总统班底》(All the President’s Men)之后最坦诚的关于新闻工作的影片。

Although both movies are well-made and well-acted — Cate Blanchett, in particular, has received raves for her portrayal of Ms. Mapes — journalists largely embraced “Spotlight” and condemned “Truth.” The reason is that while “Spotlight” shows reporters at their best — tackling a huge, important story while taking on Boston’s biggest sacred cow — the journalism that “Truth” views as heroic is anything but. In her eagerness to run a tough story, Ms. Mapes didn’t bother to nail down the authenticity of those documents. Nor did Mr. Rather push her to do so. And while the film’s writer and director, James Vanderbilt, nods at their errors, his underlying message seems to be that the larger truth they were trying to tell — the suggestion that Mr. Bush was given preferential treatment during his National Guard service in the early 1970s — should not have been undermined just because they were fooled by a few fake documents. Hence, I suppose, the movie’s title.

虽然两部影片都制作精良，表演精彩——尤其是凯特·布兰切特(Cate Blanchett)，她对梅普斯的演绎得到热烈称赞——但是大部分记者都赞美《聚焦》，谴责《真相》。因为《聚焦》展现了记者最好的一面——探究重大真相，质疑波士顿最高权威——但是《真相》所认为的英勇的记者精神却完全不是那么回事。梅普斯渴望挖掘重大故事，却没想过确定那些文件的真实性。拉瑟也没有敦促她这样做。虽然这部影片的编剧兼导演詹姆斯·范德比尔特(James Vanderbilt)承认他们犯了错，但他强调的重点似乎是他们努力讲述的更重要的真相——20世纪70年代初布什在国民警卫队服役期间受到优待——不应该因为他们被几份伪造文件欺骗而受到影响。我认为，这是片名真正的用意。

“They weren’t attacked about the substance of their story,” Mr. Vanderbilt told me recently. “They were attacked on the documents.” Which suggests that even though he wrote the screenplay for a previous film involving journalism — David Fincher’s 2007 thriller, “Zodiac” — he really doesn’t understand the difference between good reporting and bad.

“他们不是因为故事的内容遭到攻击，”前不久，范德比尔特在接受采访时说。“而是因为那些文件。”这表明，虽然他之前还写过一部与新闻工作有关的电影剧本——大卫·芬奇(David Fincher)2007年执导的惊悚片《十二宫》(Zodiac)——但他真的不明白优秀报道和劣质报道之间的区别。

“Truth” is hardly the only example of a filmmaker portraying seriously flawed journalism in a heroic light. In 2014, Michael Cuesta’s “Kill the Messenger” told the story of Gary Webb, a reporter for The San Jose Mercury News who wrote a three-part series in 1996 claiming that the country’s crack cocaine epidemic was the result of a C.I.A. conspiracy. (He claimed the agency had used hundreds of millions of dollars in illegal drug profits to finance the Nicaraguan contras.) Although Mr. Webb’s series was quickly discredited by major media outlets, including The New York Times, the film depicts the reporter as a lonely truth-seeker standing up to powerful government forces. Based on a memoir by Mr. Webb, who died in 2004, the film never acknowledges the shortcomings of his reporting, though The Mercury News eventually did.

《真相》绝不是唯一一部给具有严重错误的新闻报道冠上英雄光环的影片。2014年，迈克尔·库埃斯塔(Michael Cuesta)的《杀死信使》(Kill the Messenger)讲述的是加里·韦布(Gary Webb)的故事。韦布是《圣何塞信使报》(The San Jose Mercury News)的记者，1996年他发表了三篇连载报道，称强效纯可卡因在美国的泛滥是美国中央情报局(CIA)的阴谋（他声称，CIA用上亿美元的非法毒品收益资助尼加拉瓜反抗军）。虽然韦布的故事很快受到主要媒体的质疑，包括《纽约时报》，但是这部影片把这位记者描绘成对抗强大政府力量的孤独的寻求真相者。这部影片根据韦布（他于2004年去世）的回忆录改编，从头至尾没有承认他的报道有误，虽然《圣何塞信使报》最终承认了。

Ever since “All the President’s Men,” Alan J. Pakula’s 1976 film about the investigation by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein that led to Richard M. Nixon’s resignation, movies about journalists have almost invariably portrayed them in a glowing light — even as the public has come to take a more negative view of their craft. The classic of the genre is probably “The Insider,” the 1999 film that tells the dramatic story of yet another “60 Minutes” producer, Lowell Bergman, who, with the help of his key source, Jeffrey Wigand, a former tobacco executive, helped expose Big Tobacco. Given that Mr. Bergman was played by Al Pacino, and Mr. Wigand by Russell Crowe, how could they not have been heroic?

艾伦·J·帕库拉(Alan J. Pakula)1976年导演的影片《总统班底》讲述的是鲍勃·伍德沃德(Bob Woodward)和卡尔·伯恩斯坦(Carl Bernstein)的调查，他们的调查最终导致理查德·M·尼克松(Richard M. Nixon)辞职。自那部影片之后，关于记者的影片几乎都把他们置于光环之下——与此同时，公众对记者工作的态度变得更为负面。此类电影的经典之作当属1999年影片《惊爆内幕》(The Insider)，它讲述了《60分钟》的另一位制作人洛厄尔·伯格曼(Lowell Bergman)的精彩故事。在主要线人、前烟草公司高管杰弗里·维甘德(Jeffrey Wigand)的帮助下，他揭露了烟草业的内幕。鉴于伯格曼由阿尔·帕西诺(Al Pacino)饰演，维甘德由拉塞尔·克罗(Russell Crowe)饰演，他们怎么可能不是英雄呢？

(The outlier is Sydney Pollack’s underrated 1981 film “Absence of Malice,” in which Sally Field plays a reporter so eager for a scoop she betrays a man who has become her lover. The lover, played by Paul Newman, gets the last laugh, however, causing Ms. Field to lose her newspaper job.)

（此类影片的一个异类是西德尼·波拉克[Sydney Pollack]1981年未得到充分赞美的影片《并无恶意》[Absence of Malice]。萨莉·菲尔德[Sally Field]在片中饰演一名记者，她过于急切地想得到独家新闻，不惜背叛自己的情人。保罗·纽曼[Paul Newman]饰演的情人最终获胜，菲尔德则丢掉了工作）。

What’s always struck me as surprising about the appeal of journalists in films is that the act of reporting rarely involves secret meetings in dark garages with unnamed sources. Which is to say, it is almost never the stuff of high drama. “It’s not very glamorous,” Mr. Bergman noted. “When Michael Mann and Eric Roth were doing ‘The Insider,’” — Mr. Mann directed the film, which he wrote with Mr. Roth — “they would ask me: ‘Do you do anything? Are you always on the phone? Do you have a gimmick, a trick that you do?’”

一直让我感到惊讶的是，电影中记者的魅力之一是在黑暗的车库里与不知名的线人秘密会面，实际上记者们很少这样做。也就是说，记者工作几乎从来都不是很有戏剧性。伯格曼指出，“它不是很迷人。”迈克尔·曼(Michael Mann)和埃里克·罗思(Eric Roth)拍摄《惊爆内幕》（该片由曼导演，曼和罗思共同编剧）时，他们问我：‘你不做别的事吗？你就光打电话？你有没有什么小花招？’”

Alas, he didn’t. As a result, Mr. Mann and Mr. Roth resorted to dramatic license to make Mr. Bergman’s job seem more exciting — something movies about journalism invariably do.

唉，他没什么花招。所以，曼和罗思就利用电影允许的虚构，把伯格曼的工作编得看上去更激动人心——关于新闻工作的影片几乎都这样做过。

“Mann used to say to me, ‘We’re not making a documentary,’” Mr. Bergman said. Indeed, according to Mr. Bergman, it was William Goldman’s screenplay — and not the book by Mr. Woodward and Mr. Bernstein — that first used the phrase “Follow the money,” which their source, nicknamed Deep Throat, supposedly told Mr. Woodward. That has become one of the most famous lines associated with Watergate, yet it never appears in the book Mr. Pakula’s movie is based on.

伯格曼说：“曼对我说：‘我们不是在拍纪录片。’”的确，据伯格曼说，“查查资金流动”这句话第一次出现是在威廉·戈德曼(William Goldman)的剧本中，而非伍德沃德和伯恩斯坦的书中。在剧本中，这句话是绰号“深喉”(Deep Throat)的线人对伍德沃德说的。它已经成为与“水门事件”相关的最著名的台词，但它从未出现在帕库拉的电影所依据的书上。

Mr. Vanderbilt’s theory — and it’s a persuasive one — is that despite journalism’s dramatic shortcomings, reporters make good central characters because they are detectives with pens. “There is something inherently interesting about someone who comes to work every day saying, ‘I’m going to get to the bottom of this,’” he said.

范德比尔特的观点（一个很有说服力的观点）是，尽管新闻工作有很大的不足，但记者很适合做电影的主人公，因为他们是用笔作武器的侦探。他说：“他们每天去工作时说，‘我要把这件事弄个水落石出’，这本身就很有趣。”

“I’ve always been fascinated with journalism,” he added. But in tying his movie to a book written by a journalist unable to acknowledge her error, Mr. Vanderbilt’s fascination led him astray.

他补充说：“我一直痴迷新闻工作。”但是痴迷让他走上歧途，把自己的电影与一个不肯承认错误的记者写的书绑在一起。

In that sense, Tom McCarthy, the co-writer and director of “Spotlight,” was lucky: He didn’t have anybody’s memoir to rely on, since none of the members of the Globe’s Spotlight team had written a book about their experience. All he had were the articles, which were brought to his attention after two young producers, Nicole Rocklin and Blye Pagon Faust, read a case study published by the Columbia Journalism School. In effect, he and his co-writer, Josh Singer, had to do journalism to learn about The Globe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning journalism.

从这种意义上讲，《聚焦》的联合编剧兼导演汤姆·麦卡锡(Tom McCarthy)很幸运：他没有什么回忆录可依据，因为《波士顿环球报》聚焦调查组的成员都没有写书讲述自己的经历。他只有那些文章。两位年轻制作人妮科尔·罗克林(Nicole Rocklin)和布莱·帕根·福斯特(Blye Pagon Faust)读到哥伦比亚大学新闻研究生院(Columbia Journalism School)发布的一项个案研究，提交给麦卡锡，引起了他的注意。实际上，为了了解《波士顿环球报》获得普利策奖的新闻调查，他和联合编剧乔希·辛格(Josh Singer)必须亲自进行调查。

“In some ways, our process mirrored theirs,” he said. “We would walk out of an interview with one of the Globe reporters, and we would race back to the hotel and discuss it. We would get excited, and that inspired our approach to the material.” They had discovered the thrill of reporting by reporting. Mr. McCarthy’s goal was to convey the excitement of journalism he had discovered in interviewing The Globe’s journalists. It’s also why he didn’t feel the need to gild “Spotlight” with extraneous subplots and long-suffering spouses.

他说：“从某种程度上讲，我们的调查过程反映了他们的调查过程。我们采访完《波士顿环球报》的一位记者，就马上返回酒店讨论。我们很兴奋，这激发了我们处理素材的灵感。”他在报道的过程中发现了报道令人兴奋的地方。麦卡锡的目的是表达出他在采访《波士顿环球报》记者的过程中所感受到的新闻工作的激动人心之处。所以他觉得不需要为了修饰《聚焦》，来添加无关的次要情节或者增加一个长期忍耐的配偶角色。

Mr. McCarthy and Mr. Singer even uncovered a few new facts. One in particular stands out. They learned that years earlier, The Globe had run an article suggesting that 20 priests had molested children — and that the article had been buried in the Metro section. The two men found the article and confronted Mr. Robinson about it.

麦卡锡和辛格甚至发现了一些新情况。其中一个情况格外引人注目。他们发现，多年之前，《波士顿环球报》就刊登一篇文章，指出有20位神父性侵儿童。那篇文章被淹没在“大都会”版里。两人发现了这篇文章，并向罗宾逊求证。

“Yeah, that was me,” a chagrined Mr. Robinson said. He had just become the Metro editor, he added. “I don’t remember it at all.” Though it never actually happened during the Spotlight investigation itself, Mr. McCarthy added that scene toward the end of the film. Even in a movie depicting journalism at its most exciting, Mr. McCarthy, like all filmmakers apparently, still felt the need to spice it up a bit.

懊恼的罗宾逊说：“是的，是我写的。但我完全把它忘了。”他还补充道，他当时刚成为“大都会”版的编辑。麦卡锡把这一幕加到了片尾，虽然这一幕从未真的出现在聚焦调查组的调查过程中。就算在这部描绘了记者工作最令人兴奋之处的影片中，麦卡锡显然和所有的制片人一样，仍然觉得需要给它加点料。

It seems inevitable that filmmakers will continue to make movies about journalists, especially if “Truth” and “Spotlight” receive Oscar nominations. And dramatic license is something journalists will have to get used to, if they’re not already. The real question is whether the movies will ever truly understand the difference between good reporting and bad, as Mr. McCarthy did and Mr. Vanderbilt did not. Don’t get your hopes up. It’s the movies after all.

电影制作人们似乎不可避免地还会拍摄关于记者的电影，尤其是如果《真相》和《聚焦》获得奥斯卡奖提名的话。记者们将不得不适应电影允许虚构这一点——如果他们现在还不适应的话。真正的问题是那些电影能否真正理解优秀报道和劣质报道的区别——这一点麦卡锡做到了，范德比尔特没有。不要抱太大希望。毕竟，这是电影。