一邊諷刺托尼，一邊影射自己

76-year-old Roman Polanski hit the headlines worldwide after his arrest in Switzerland last year in connection with the sexual assault of an underage girl in America in 1977. But the Ghost Writer, Polanski's first film in four years, once again reminds people of his enviable talents in filmmaking and cold intelligence and puts him in the news, this time for a good reason.

A gifted author (Ewan McGregor) is hired to pump up the memoirs of former British Prime Minister Adam Lang (Pierce Brosnan) after the last ghostwriter commits suicide and a replacement is needed.

But as the new ghostwriter stumbles on photos and documents that lead him to investigate Lang's explosive secrets and the mystery surrounding the former writer's death, he already unconsciously begins to transform (metaphorically) from a ghostwriter into a real ghost.

In the Ghost Writer, Adam Lang is accused of aiding and abetting torture of suspect terrorists by the international court in The Hague and therefore is sent to kind of exile on an isolated island off the coast of Boston. Who wouldn't say the movie echoes the situation of the director whose rape case 33 years ago made him flee the US for good?

Unlike Polanski's early work, the Ghost Writer leaves the old track of blood and fear but offers more of the pleasure from racking your brain to connect the random clues and dots. Having said that, the build-up part, which runs 90% of the length, may appear too steady or even a bit slow for some impatient moviegoers eager to find out the truth. But it pays off in the last 15 minutes with an astonishing end and lends strong support for the saying that to quit a movie halfway through is usually an unwise decision.

In this two-hour political conspiracy tale a viewer would take little effort to find the fictional PM mimicking Tony Blair in any way. Even Adam's wife in the movie (Olivia 威廉斯) bears a resemblance to Cherie Blair. Why did Tony Blair, during his ten-year-stint as Prime Minister, do exactly what 華盛頓 wanted on so many occasions? Polanski gives the question a bold guess in his movie. Moreover, Robert 哈里斯, the writer of the movie's screenplay as well as its source novel, brings the film not only an impressive dialogue but also a credible extra given that he hung around in the Downing Street for quite a few years as a political journalist.

On a 10-point scale, I give the Ghost Writer a hyper-articulate and intelligent 7.