Ferry to Hong Kong1959

Director
Lewis Gilbert

Acters

Curd Juergens (Mark Conrad)
Orson Welles (Captain Hart)
Sylvia Syms (Liz Ferrers)
Jeremy Spenser (Miguel Henriques)
Noel Purcell (Joe Skinner)
Margaret Withers (Miss Carter)

Pirates, typhoons, shipwrecks and an all-star cast in this sea-bound adventure.

Mark Conrad, a habitual drunk and troublemaker with a shady past, is expelled by Hong Kong police after one too many bar fights. He’s sent to Macao on the Fa Tsan, a ferry owned by Captain Hart. Conrad’s papers are out of order and Macao refuses him entry. Unable to go ashore, Conrad is a permanent passenger on the ferry with Hart, who detests him. It’s all one long, lazy voyage for Conrad until one fateful trip when an encounter with a typhoon and pirates forces Conrad to choose between an aimless drifter’s life and becoming a man again.

Produced by Rank as its first CinemaScope feature, the big-budget movie is based on the real-life tale of Steven Ragan, a stateless drifter who was stuck for ten months on the ferry sailing between Hong Kong and Macau from September 18, 1952, to July 30, 1953.

“’Ferry to Hong Kong’ could be seen as a 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. It conveyed imperial nostalgia and loss. The film turns the antihero into a paragon of British gallantry who saves the passengers and refugees from the hands of Chinese (Communist) pirates. More than an adventure of a vagabond, ‘Ferry to Hong Kong’ was an espionage thriller in uneasy disguise.” – Global Storytelling

“The Asian locations are beautiful and completely genuine, and Gilbert’s picturesque, travelogue direction flows nicely. By the end you’ll want to spend more time aboard, feeling that, for better or worse, you really know these people within a cozy enough boat to be stuck without a paddle.” – Cult Film Freaks