Foreign Correspondent (1940)
Ironically, it was a movie that propelled me into Journalism. I was 12 years old when I saw Alfred Hitchcock’s Foreign Correspondent […] The film ends in the London Blitz with a radio announcer introducing Haverstock on the air. “We have as a guest tonight one of the soldiers of the press,” he shouts amid the wail of air raid sirens, “…one of the little army of historians who are writing history from beside the cannon’s mouth…”.
I never looked back, I read my father’s conservative Daily Telegraph from cover to cover, always the foreign reports, lying on the floor beside the fire as my mother pleaded with me to drink my cocoa and go to bed. At school I studied The Times each afternoon. I ploughed through Khrushchev’s entire speech denouncing Stalin’s reign of terror. I won the school Current Affairs prize and never -ever - could anyone shake me from my determination to be a foreign correspondent.
年前讀英國《獨立報》記者Robert Fisk 的The Great War for Civilisation，讀到上面一段文字，心想，一定要看看 Foreign Correspondent (海外特派員)這齣電影。
一提起希治閣 (Alfred Hitchcock)，立即想到的必定是《矚目驚心》、《迷魂記》等經典，有多少人會想起1940年的 Foreign Correspondent呢？
電影的數個經典鏡頭大概不用我多花唇舌了，電影主角海外特派員Johnny Jones 的心路歷程，以及電影的時代背景更叫我感興趣。你可以說這是一齣二戰的propaganda，旨在呼籲美國支持英國抗德。出自希治閣的propaganda當然不會是黨八股了。
二戰爆發前夕，New York Globe 的老總不滿海外特派員傳回來的稿子仿如流水賬，便決定派一個完全不熟悉歐洲的記者Johnny Jones (後被老總改名為Huntley Haverstock) 到那兒，希望他以一個「fresh, unused mind」去發掘新聞。一句「How would you like to cover the biggest story in the world today? 」便把他推到歐洲去。
Jones最初到歐洲去純粹要發掘新聞，結果如願以嘗找到大新聞——倫敦和平組織領袖原來是納粹間諜﹗但Jones 卻不能只冷眼旁觀，而是由此至於都參與其中：追捕殺手，被殺手追殺，乘坐的客機被德軍擊落……更要命的是，間諜是女友的父親﹗幾經劫難，Jones 終於不負所託為老總報道了「the biggest story in the world」，然後折返倫敦，跟英國人共同進退，並呼籲美國同胞支持。
老總初時找Jones，是因為歐洲需要「fresh, unused mind」去發掘新聞。飽歷滄桑的Jones已經不能當歐洲發生的一切看成報上一則新聞便算，而是全情投入，成為 “soldiers of the press,” “the little army of historians” 的一員。
如此滿腔熱血是否有違中立持平？我不知道，但只知道身為一個人沒有可能總是冷眼旁觀，把每個人每件事都看成報上的一則story。
Robert Fisk 看這齣電影時才12歲，29歲那年他被派駐中東。據他自述，外聞版主編給他這樣的一封信：
[…] and to you I offer the Middle East. Let me know if you want it… It would be a splendid opportunity for you, with good stories, lots of travel and sunshine…
當然，中東對Robert Fisk而言從來都不是 “good stories” 。
