Vietnamese Cinema: The Power of the Past

Abstract

IN 1985 the Hawai'i International Film Festival showed Dang Nhat Minh's When the Tenth Month Comes (1984), the first Vietnamese feature to be shown at a U.S. film festival. A great success with both the critics and the public, it was nominated for the East-West Center Award for the film that best promotes understanding among the peoples of Asia, the Pacific, and the United States, and received a special honorable mention from the jury. The Vietnam Cinema Department sent the Festival staff a lacquer painting and let us know through our intermediaries on the U.S. Committee for Scientific Cooperation with Vietnam-Professors Judith Ladinsky and Stephen O'Harrow-that they were pleased with the experience. The next year, we were sent an earlier, less interesting film, Vu Dai Village in Those Days (1982). The HIFF Selection Committee felt it would be valuable to have some personal contact with the Vietnam Cinema Department and to view a large selection of features and documentaries for possible future screening. With the help of that department, the U.S. Committee, and the Vietnamese embassy in Bangkok, I was granted a visa to visit Hanoi from July 7 to 13, 1987. Stepping from the plane into Vietnam seemed to me like a dream. Images of that country and its people have imbedded themselves deeply into our American minds and joined themselves with a mix of strong emotions. Here then were the men in their green pith helmets and uniforms and the women in their black pants suits and white conical hats, all moving gracefully in three dimensions and in a curious quiet. The grace and silence remain among my strongest impressions. Two young men from the Cinema Department-Nguyen Van Tinh and Duong Manh Hien-picked me up and whisked me into a car. Throughout