Last month the 3rd International Vietnamese Film Festival took place again in Irvine, CA. I wished I could have attended, for I was dying to see The Rebel, but school + work kept me busy as bee. But what else is new in Saigonywood?
The Rebel – The buzz these months is Charlie Nguyen’s martial art period film The Rebel starring Johnny Tri Nguyen, Ngo Thanh Van, Dustin Tri Nguyen and a few others. The website finally got updated as well, so you can hopefully keep up to date about this really-cool-kick-ass-looking film. Check out the trailer which shows some very professional and stunning martial art choreography. Can’t wait to see the Vietnamese folks kick those French asses (excusez moi). In addition to having screend at last month’s Vietnamese film festival in Irvine, it was also shown at the Visual Communications Film Festival in LA, and was even shown in Ha Noi and Saigon (no, not those cheap DVDs you find in Cho Lon). I can’t find any info on when exactly it will screen in other cities at normal movie theaters yet, but if you happen to know, just add your info below.
Saigon Eclipse – well, and now get this, there’s another action movie starring Dustin Nguyen and Johnny Nguyen coming out this year. Huh? Yeah, I am not kidding. It’s an action flick called Saigon Ecplise based on Vietnam’s famous epic poem Truyen Kieu set in modern-day Saigon (and entirely shot there too). The movie already won Special Jury Prize at the Worldfest Houston Film Festival and was also screened at the previously-mentioned Visual Communications Film Festival. The movie premiered in Vietnam just a few days ago, but I don’t know when or where it will screen overseas yet, so simply check out the website for yourself.
Journey from the Fall – In case you haven’t noticed the theaters listing on the main website yet, but Journey from the Fall just keeps on going and going, and it’s not even powered by a pink bunny! I remember how director Ham Tran told me earlier this year that he’ll be happy as long as the movie can last from its premiere on May 23rd until the April 30th (the Fall of Saigon commemoration date). Well, as you can see it surpassed everyone’s expectation and continues to roll out over the next months in many more cities such as Atlanta, Austin, Honolulu, Kansas City, Orlando, Philadelphia, Gulfport, Minneapolis, Las Vegas, Boston, and San Antonio, just to name a few. The Australia release has been postponed to about September 2007. San Jose’s continuous screening at Camera 12 in particular broke the theater’s all-time-gross-record-of-any-movie-every-played there, beating Pirates of the Caribbean 2, and Star Wars Episode 3. Journey from the Fall also just received the AZN Asian Excellence Award for Best Independent Film, so if you haven’t seen it yet, I don’t know what are you waiting for.
Reporting live from the second floor of the Mountain View library, this is Minh T. Nguyen (pronounced Minh T. Nguyen), now back to you (or rather back to studying).
Past Vietnamese Buzz entries: April 2007 March 2007 October 2006 September 2006 July 2006 June 2006 April 2006 March 2006 February 2006 January 2006