如果有人問你是否是女權主義者，你會立刻回答「不是」嗎？如果有人問你是否支持女權運動，你會立刻回答「是」嗎？雖然大多數人理論上支持性別平等，但是在很多人心目中，「女權主義」未必是完全正面的標簽，有人可能認爲它意味著「仇視男性」和反主流。由英國電影協會（BFI）等機構投資一千四百萬美金、講述英國女性如何獲得選舉權的歷史電影《女權之聲》，11月12日在香港首映後三天已跨入本地票房前十名之列，目前排位仍在十名上下，全球票房則已經收回投資。在香港普選前景迷茫、中國女權五姊妹無端被捕的2015年，《女權之聲》對我們至少有雙重意義。
If someone asked you if you are a feminist, would you immediately answer “no”? If someone asked you if you support feminist movement, would you immediately answer “yes”? Although most people are theoretically in favor of gender equality, in the minds of many, ‘feminism’ may not be an entirely positive label, and may be perceived by some as ‘man-hating’ and anti-mainstream. The film “Feminist Voices”, which was invested by the British Film Institute (BFI) and other organizations with an investment of 14 million US dollars and tells the story of how women gained the right to vote in the United Kingdom, has entered the top ten of the local box office in three days after its premiere in Hong Kong on November 12, and is currently still ranked in the top ten or so, and has already recouped its investment at the global box office. In 2015, when the prospect of universal suffrage in Hong Kong is uncertain and the five Chinese feminist sisters were arrested for no apparent reason, The Feminist Voice has at least a double meaning for us.
我們必須了解的歷史 The History We Need To Know
女性投票權的爭取，在各國女性歷史上都曾佔據重要的位置，因此所有關於爭取投票權的故事，本身就具有世界性。影片的中心人物是嘉莉慕萊根扮演的洗衣女工慕德，其角色設置以千百個低層女工為基礎，其命運則綜合了不少人的遭遇：她出生在洗衣廠，未見過父親，4歲失去母親，7歲開始兼職，12歲開始全職工作，20歲升任洗衣厰組長，影片開始時，24歲的她已有丈夫和七歲的兒子，不過工資和兒子都屬於丈夫。選擇這個年輕女工作爲主角，讓對於當時社會狀況不了解的觀眾，有機會從她的生活和視點，目睹女性面對的剝削與不受尊重，了解「潘琦黨」成員破壞行動的原因，親見被政府官員欺騙之後，警察如何用暴力驅散聚集的婦女。慕德一旦開始嚮往與男性平等的生活，就在第一次參加行動後被捕，並立刻被丈夫逐出家門，後來丈夫甚至把兒子送人。無家可歸時，同伴幫她度過難關，也讓她看到爭取女權的戰綫不分階級。後來有官員誘惑她做臥底，但她謹記潘琦「寧做叛逆、不做奴隸」的目標，沒有出賣同伴，也沒有背離初衷。
The struggle for women’s right to vote has played an important part in the history of women in every country, so all stories about the struggle for the right to vote have a global dimension. The central character of the film is Carrie Mulligan’s Maud Watts, a 24 year old laundry worker, whose characterization is based on that of hundreds of lowly women workers, and whose fate is a combination of many: she was born in a laundry factory without ever having met her father, lost her mother at age 4, started working part-time at age 7, began working full-time at age 12, and rose to become a laundry crew chief at age 20. The son belongs to her husband. By choosing this young woman as the main character, viewers who do not know much about the social situation at that time will have the opportunity to see from her life and point of view the exploitation and disrespect that women faced, the reasons for the destructive actions of the members of the Panchayat Party, and how the police violently dispersed the gathering of women after they had been deceived by the government officials. Once Maud begins to yearn for a life equal to that of men, she is arrested after her first action and is immediately expelled from her home by her husband, who later even gives her son away. When she became homeless, her fellow activists helped her to survive and showed her that the fight for women’s rights knew no boundaries. Later, an official lures her to become an undercover agent, but she remembers Emmeline Pankhurst’s goal of being a rebel rather than a slave, and does not betray her companions or deviate from her original goal.
影片中兩位配角卻是歷史上真有其人。一位是英國女性投票權運動領導人艾美琳潘琦（1858-1928）。潘琦從小通過父母了解社會運動，婚後組織女性社會政治聯盟，得到比她年長24歲的律師丈夫的支持，成為選舉權運動領袖。由於各種和平請願、提案一概被無視，她號召組織成員使用集會、破壞通信系統、獄中絕食等手段，逼迫政府接受女性的訴求。另一位是潘琦的信徒愛米麗戴維森（1872-1913），她入獄多達九次，並因為絕食而被強行灌食49次。在1913年英國年度賽馬會上，她走到國王喬治五世的馬前，試圖把寫著「女性參選」的絲巾系在馬上，但被奔跑中的馬撞踏身亡。各國媒體都報道了這件事，女性社會政治聯盟組織了她的葬禮，數百成員參加，還有數千倫敦市民圍觀。此後不久一戰爆發，潘琦決定暫停行動而支持英國參戰，英國女性因此有機會通過積極的渠道，展示了她們的能力，並終於在一戰結束的1918年，獲得了部分（三十歲以上）投票權；真正做到和男性一樣21歲就獲權投票，則又過了十年才實現。
Two of the movie’s supporting characters are real people in history. One is a confidante of Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928), the leader of the women’s suffrage movement in England. After learning about social movements through her parents, she organized the Women’s Social and Political Union after her marriage, and with the support of her lawyer husband, who was 24 years older than her, she became a leader of the suffrage movement. As all peaceful petitions and proposals were ignored, she called on members of her organization to force the government to accept women’s demands by means of rallies, disruption of communication systems, and hunger strikes in prison. Another was Emily Davidson (1872-1913), a confidante of Emmeline Pankhurst, who was imprisoned nine times and force-fed 49 times for her hunger strikes. At the 1913 Annual British Jockey Club, she walked up to King George V’s horse and attempted to tie a silk scarf reading “Women’s Suffrage” onto the horse, but was run over and killed by the galloping horse. The event was covered by the national press and the Women’s Social and Political Union organized her funeral, which was attended by hundreds of members and thousands of Londoners. When World War I broke out shortly thereafter, Pankhurst decided to suspend action in favor of Britain’s entry into the war, and British women had the opportunity to demonstrate their ability through active channels, and finally gained partial (over-30) suffrage in 1918, at the end of World War I. It took another decade for them to actually gain the right to vote at the age of 21, just as men did.
銀幕背後的女性陣營 The Women Behind the Screen
發行《女權之聲》的驕陽電影公司，以「金像影后列陣、打出一片新天地」為廣告詞，但忽略了影片主創也是一個強大的女性陣營：女導演莎拉加隆、女編劇艾碧摩根、女監製艾莉森歐文和菲沃德，都是有著驕人成績的女性電影人。沃德監製過《簡愛》（2011），歐文監製過《伊麗莎白》（1998）。導演加隆是英國印刷大亨、前倫敦副市長的女兒，從拍攝紀錄片入行，首次執導劇情長片《石板巷》（Brick Lane， 2007）就獲得英國電影學會和英國獨立電影獎分別頒發的最佳導演獎。編劇摩根大學畢業後，在餐飲業工作時曾為戴卓爾夫人服務過；二十年後她寫了傳記片《鐵娘子》的劇本。她改編作品中，還有一出獲得眾多獎項的《此時此刻》（The Hours, 2002），把生活在1923年的英國女作家伍爾芙、生活在1951年的洛杉磯的主婦蘿拉．布朗，以及2001年生活在紐約的女同性戀編輯的故事，把三個不同的時空之中、三位女性的命運的巧合和關照完美地編織在一起。
Sundream Motion Pictures, the company that distributed Suffragette in Hong Kong, advertises the film as “a new world of work with a new set of Academy Award winners,” but neglects to mention that the film’s creators are also a strong female cast: director Sarah Gavron, screenwriter Abi Morgan, and producers Alison Owen and Faye Ward, all of whom are accomplished female filmmakers. Ward produced Jane Eyre (2011) and Irving produced Elizabeth (1998). Director Gavron, the daughter of a British printing tycoon and former Deputy Mayor of London, began her career as a documentary filmmaker, and won the BAFTA and BAFTA for Best Director in her feature film debut, Brick Lane (2007). After graduating from university, screenwriter Morgan worked in the catering industry serving Mrs. Margaret Thatcher; twenty years later she wrote the screenplay for the biopic The Iron Lady. Among her adaptations is the award-winning The Hours (2002), which brings together Virginia Woolf, a British writer living in 1923; Laura Brown, a housewife in 1951 Los Angeles; and Laura Brown, a woman living in 2001 New York City and a lesbian editor living in New York City in 2001. The story of the three women’s destinies in three different time periods is perfectly woven together by the coincidence of the three women’s destinies and their careers.
兩位監製2011年就已約定編劇和導演準備合作《女權之聲》，但到2014年2月才落實資金、開始拍攝。影片除了由史翠普客串潘琦、慕萊根扮演慕德，還有海倫娜寶咸卡達扮演一位激進的、獲得藥劑師丈夫支持的行動家。卡達在扮演這個虛構人物時，以曾經為女性社會政治聯盟培訓保鏢的女武師伊迪斯嘉魯德（1872-1971）為原型。卡達的曾祖父阿斯奎斯時任英國首相，反對給予婦女投票權；因此卡達的參與可謂有心為之。英國電影協會能夠出資，把這部影片的主創權交給女性導演、監製和編劇，英國國會甚至首次借出內景場地供其拍攝，這本身就讓世界其他地方的女性電影人羨慕！
The two producers had already booked the writer and director to collaborate on Suffragette in 2011, but it was only in February 2014 that funding was secured and filming began. The film stars Streep as Pankhurst, Mulligan as Maud, and Helena Bonham Carter as a radical activist supported by her pharmacist husband. In the role of this fictional character, Carter modeled her character after Edith Garrud (1872-1971), a female martial artist who trained bodyguards for the Women’s Social and Political Union. Her great-grandfather, Asquith, was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and opposed women’s right to vote, so Carter’s involvement was intentional. The fact that the BFI was able to finance the film and give it to a female director, producer and screenwriter, and that the British Parliament even lent its interior locations for the first time, is the envy of female filmmakers elsewhere in the world!
性別歧視與女性主義 Sexism and Feminism
時至今日，不願公開支持女權的男性，只能說距離真正擁有「民主意識」還有相當的路程；而所有女性都有責任了解我們曾祖母、祖母輩的女性，當年如何用意志與犧牲，為我們爭取到今天女性所享受的一切人權與公民權。《女權之聲》影片結尾，有一個長長的各國女性獲得投票權的時間綫，我們從中看到新西蘭是1893年，俄羅斯是1918年，而歐美大部分國家也在一戰結束後不久，做到男女投票平權；在1949年下面，赫然寫著中國和印度。印度女性至今仍舊生活在強姦、暴力的威脅之中；而中國的「男女平等」當年似乎毛澤東主席一句話、新中國幾條法律就解決了的問題，到了今天似乎危機四伏。性別平等和民主一樣，意識一旦覺醒，就再無回頭的可能。我們都應該學習慕德，爲了不受奴役的生活，爲了下一代的幸福，做出自己的努力。
Today, men who are unwilling to openly support women’s rights can only say that they have a long way to go before they have a true sense of democracy, and it is incumbent upon all women to understand how our great-grandmothers and grandmothers fought with will and sacrifice for all the human rights and civil rights that women enjoy today. At the end of Suffragette, there is a long sequence of women’s access to the vote in various countries, in which we see that in New Zealand it was 1893, in Russia it was 1918, and most countries in Europe and the United States achieved equal voting rights for both men and women shortly after the end of the First World War; and underneath the year 1949, China and India are written in bold letters. In India, women still live under the threat of rape and violence, while in China, “gender equality,” which seemed to have been solved by a single statement (that “time is different now, men and women are the same”) from Chairman Mao Zedong and a few laws in the New China, seems to be in great peril today. Gender equality, like democracy, is an awareness that once awakened, there is no turning back. We should all follow Maud’s example and do our part for a life free from slavery and for the happiness of the next generation.
在《女權之聲》中，史翠普扮演的潘琦只有一場戲，卻是全片的重頭戲之一，就是在婦女集會上演講，據説史翠普模仿潘琦演技可以亂真。扮演了女權先驅，她自然會被問到是否是「女性主義者」，但她自稱是「人性主義者」，令不少女權主義者感到失望。我們還記得早前今年春天奧斯卡頒獎典禮上，當最佳女配角派翠西亞艾奎特用發表獲獎感言的機會，抨擊好萊塢薪酬方面嚴重的性別歧視時，史翠普立刻起立叫好。九月時她還親自動員國會成員支持平權增補條款，後來又出資鼓勵四十歲以上的女性寫出自己的第一個劇本。這一切行動之後，她對於女性主義這個稱謂的保留，值得我們深思。
There is only one scene where Streep plays Pankhurst in Suffragette, but it is one of the highlights of the movie, which is a speech at a women’s rally, and it is said that Streep’s impersonation of Pankhurst can be taken for real. As a feminist pioneer, she is naturally asked if she is a “feminist,” but she calls herself a “humanist,” to the dismay of many feminists. We remember earlier this spring at the Oscars, when Best Supporting Actress Patricia Arquette took the opportunity of her acceptance speech to attack the grossly sexist nature of Hollywood paychecks, Streep immediately stood up and applauded. In September, she also personally enlisted members of Congress to support affirmative action, and later funded a campaign to encourage women over 40 to write their first screenplays. After all these actions, her retention of the term feminism is worth pondering.
看完《女權之聲》，完全認同舒琪說這部電影「有骨氣、有正氣」，也認同發行公司的廣告詞「從認命中覺醒，做自己的主宰」。想到去年此時，香港街頭的身影，相信他們都能從這部沉著、冷靜的電影中獲得啓發和鼓勵。
After watching Suffragette, I totally agree with Shek Kei’s comment that the movie demonstrates “backbone and integrity”, and also agree with the distributor’s tagline “Awaken from your destiny, be your own master”. Thinking of the figures on the streets of Hong Kong at this time last year, I believe they can all be inspired and encouraged by this calm and cool movie.
Citation: S. Louisa Wei. “Suffragette: The Awakening from Women’s Fate” [魏時煜，《從認命中覺醒的〈女權之聲〉》]. Mingpao Daily News 明報, 2015-11-23, D4.
On Women's Cinema 