《港澳輪渡》：大英帝國在戰後香港的創傷寓言

Abstract

《港澳輪渡》（Ferry to Hong Kong）在1959 年陽曆新年前夕在香港上映。這部高成本的電影，是英國蘭克電影製作公司（The Rank Organisation）的首部寬銀幕電影，電影主人公是一位滯留在來往香港和澳門的渡輪上十個月的無國籍漂流者。這部電影在全球票房慘淡，除了因為英美合製出現矛盾，娛樂與政治宣傳的不和諧也讓敘事支離破碎。在亞洲冷戰的脈絡下，英國通過電影軟實力的渠道來重建國家尊嚴，尤其是1956 年蘇伊士運河危機讓大英帝國走向衰亡崩解，世界霸主地位逐漸被美國取代。電影把一位反英雄角色轉變成一位英國勇士，從中國（共產黨）海盜手上解救船上的乘客和難民。這艘沉沒的船是英國海洋殖民霸主的一個創傷寓言，浪漫和自戀式地緬懷著大英帝國在盛世時期對亞洲和南半球輝煌燦爛的影響力。

On New Year’s Eve 1959, Ferry to Hong Kong was screened in Hong Kong. Produced by Rank as its first CinemaScope feature, the big-budget movie tells tale of a stateless drifter who was stuck for ten months on the ferry sailing between Hong Kong and Macau. The film was a flop across the globe not only because of the splitting Anglo-American cooperation, but also because the demands of entertainment and propaganda clashed, falling apart in the film’s storytelling. Positioned within Cold War contexts, however, Ferry to Hong Kong could be seen as British cultural-diplomatic response through cinematic soft power to reestablish national assurance on Asian Cold War fronts following the 1956 Suez Canal debacle that witnessed the death of Britain’s imperial might at the hands of the Eisenhower administration. But the film turns the anti-hero into a paragon of British gallantry who saves the passengers and refugees from the hands of Chinese (communist) pirates. The sinking ferry-boat is the traumatic device to recall British naval war stories and retell romantic and narcissistic tales of British valor and international influence in Asia and Global South.