Minh T. Nguyen

San Francisco Premiere
USA/Thailand 2005 | 134 mins | Color 35mm | English, Vietnamese w/E.S.

Fresh from its screening at the Sundance Film Festival, JOURNEY FROM THE FALL is the first major American film to dramatize the traumatic aftermath of the Vietnam War from a Vietnamese perspective. Unlike Hollywood films with a one-sided focus on the American psyche, Ham Tran’s impressive feature-length debut delves into the stories of those left behind after the fall of Saigon.

Despite his allegiance to the toppled South Vietnamese government, Long Nguyen decides to remain in Vietnam. Arrested and imprisoned in a Communist re-education camp, he urges his family to make the treacherous escape by boat without him. They embark on the arduous ocean voyage, braving sickness, starvation and pirates in the hope of reaching the U.S. and freedom. Back in Vietnam, Long suffers years of solitary confinement and hard labor, and finally despairs that his family has perished. But news of their successful resettlement in America inspires him to make one last desperate attempt to join them.

This gorgeous, gripping epic skillfully interweaves the little-known horrors of the re-education camps with a visceral account of the trials and triumphs of the refugee experience. With superb performances and luminous cinematography, it tells an intensely moving story with dignity and astonishing lyricism. Filmed in the lush terrain of Southeast Asia by Guillermo Rosas (BEFORE NIGHT FALLS) and the sun-baked streets of California by Julie Kirkwood, JOURNEY FROM THE FALL is a tribute to the perseverance and hope of the Vietnamese people, and a testament to the beauty and power of filmmaking.

Kiều
http://www.kieuthemovie.com/

World Premiere
USA 2006 | 75 mins | Color Video | English, Vietnamese w/E.S.

KIỀU bursts open like a flower one colorful Mission morning as the lovely heroine steps out for the day. Waving to her goldfish, she flirts with the smitten greengrocer and mulls over the election at the flower shop. But as day moves into night, and the bus takes her into the Tenderloin, we see that Kiều works at an “Oriental” massage parlor, desperately making money to send to her family in Vietnam. In one 24-hour slice of her life, a shocking encounter threatens to destroy Kiều's carefully compartmentalized existence, and bring forth the ghosts of her past.

Director Vu has appropriated the ingredients of a potentially maudlin melodrama and created a fresh, intensely tender look at one young woman’s experience. Loosely based on Vietnam’s epic nineteenth-century poem The Tale of Kiều , in which the heroine sells herself to redeem her family’s debt, the film re-situates Kiều in the neighborhoods of 21st-century San Francisco. It’s a passionate, supple work that balances documentary-like footage of massage parlor life with the occasional apparition of ghostly kindred spirits. Created by Bay Area filmmaking collective Sycamore Street Productions, KIỀU is an epic fable of yesterday, and a telling vision of women’s survival and perseverance today.