Films for Vietnamese Memories of War

From mchale@gwu.edu Mon Nov 26 17:23:02 2001

Date: Sun, 11 Nov 2001 15:46:30 -0500

From: mchale <mchale@gwu.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: FWD: H-Asia: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

List,

I am forwarding a query from H-ASIA, as I thought some of you might be able to help Ms. Standen.

Shawn McHale

>===== Original Message From H-Net list for Asian History and Culture

<H-ASIA@H-NET.MSU.EDU> =====

H-ASIA

*****************************

From: Naomi Standen <naomi.standen@ncl.ac.uk>

Next semester I am team-teaching (with an Americanist) a first-year course called "War and Memory in Vietnam and the USA". Prompted by Vincent Pollard's recent H-Asia posting re. four (very useful-looking) recent Vietnamese films, I am reminded that I need to try to dig out some more such material.

The course is split into Before, During and After the war, with pretty much zero interest in the military course of the war and a very strong emphasis on how the war has been remembered (or not) and used (or abused) since the events themselves - the "skills" element is chiefly practice at critiquing primary sources (see Module Outline Form link from

http://www.staff.ncl.ac.uk/naomi.standen/warandmem/warandmemfpg.htm.

This means using some of the huge pile of US material re. reporting, the TV war, the Vietnam movie genre, the Washington memorial(s) etc. Of course, there is far less material readily available from the Vietnamese side of things, but I am looking for parallels and contrasts. There's quite a bit of literature in translation, but I'd also like to use film, since otherwise the power of that medium will be handed over entirely to the US side of things (which may be representative of the power it has actually had in the relevant culture(s?), but I'd like students to be able to think about that having seen some of the (contrasting?) Vietnamese film output).

I know about films like The Scent of Green Papaya and Cyclo, and have done a bit of searching on the usual sites (AEMS and the like - interestingly relatively little there, especially on the war), but I wonder if colleagues have any suggestions for favourite or little-known Vietnamese films that might be used in the context described above? Of course I am particularly interested in things that deal with the war itself, however indirectly - hence Green

Papaya and Cyclo are not quite what I'm after at this point. I'd like students to be able to make the comparison between the ways the war is remembered in film on the two sides.

Thanks in advance,

Naomi Standen

--

Dr. Naomi Standen | E-mail: naomi.standen@ncl.ac.uk

Department of History | Tel: +44 191 222 6490

University of Newcastle | Fax: +44 191 222 6484

UK | Homepage: www.staff.ncl.ac.uk/naomi.standen

From dnfox@hotmail.com Mon Nov 26 17:23:09 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 05:43:55 +0000

From: Diane Fox <dnfox@hotmail.com>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: FWD: H-Asia: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

For what it may be worth, I'll list some of the films I use for a course called "Viet Nam: Histories, Place, and Memory"--which seems to have some similarities to the course mentioned, but focuses less directly on the war (hence, the 'for what it may be worth')

"Remembrances of the Countryside", by Dang Nhat Minh, based rather loosely on a Nguyen Huy Thiep short story. A 17 year old boy comes of age encountering a Viet Kieu who has come back to his village. Deals with city/countryside tensions, poverty, and love of the que huong. In Vietnamese is the only problem, but it works well anyway, if you or someone else can translate(the images are powerful enough to carry the story, and the dialogue is not fast paced)

"The Story of Kindness" (aka "Decency", or "How to Behave"), by Tran Van Thuy. A great film, internationally prize-winning, that leaves students thinking deeply about life, but also contains some references to the war--the people as exalted when they are needed for battle, for instance, and forgotten later. English subtitles.

Also by Thuy: "The Sound of the Violin at My Lai", dubbed in English. Won best short film at the 1999 Asian Pacific film festival. Mixes clips of My Lai then and now on the occasion of the opening of a Vietnamese-American Peace Park. An American veteran plays taps on his violin.(Thuy has another film I've used, "The Life of the Soul", about spirits and death, but that doesn't seem appropriate. Another film, "Story from the Corner of a Park", which is a meditation on the grace with which a family whose two children may be suffering the affects of Agent Orange live their lives, may soon be subtitled, but not yet.)

"Where War Has Passed"--a documentary on the aftermath of Agent Orange, by Vu Le My and Luong Duc. Won first place in a German film festival, and second place in an environmental festival in Tokyo, silver medal in Viet Nam. A call to action, intended for a Vietnamese audience, but then translated by the Quakers and others. "Deadly Debris"--again by Duc and My, again translated by the same folks. This grew out of the first film, when farmers call out to the flimmakers to be careful, they were standing in a field sprinkled with cluster bombs. It is on landmines. Each film is about 25-30 minutes long.

There is an oral history sort of film called "Regret to Inform", made by an American war widow, with interviews of Vietnamese and American widows. I haven't used it, but will.

And then there are the songs of Trinh Cong Son--not films, of course, but could be good in such a course. There are some songs you can play (The Mother's Legacy, When My Country is at Peace), then ask the students what they hear, and then give the words--helps dramatize the distance we need to go to understand. But several of his songs in translation have been very powerful for my students, even without the music.

Well--as I say, for what it's worth. Good luck! I'd like to hear what you come up with--it could be useful for my class too!

Diane

From quynh-du.ton-that@anu.edu.au Mon Nov 26 17:23:14 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 17:39:24 +1100

From: ton-that quynh-du <quynh-du.ton-that@anu.edu.au>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: FWD: H-Asia: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

The Quiet American should be released soon. Post production are putting the final touches on and working on some final dialogues. I believe it should be released before the year is over.

Du

From martin.grossheim@rz.hu-berlin.de Mon Nov 26 17:23:19 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 14:39:23 +0100

From: Martin Grossheim <martin.grossheim@rz.hu-berlin.de>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Vietnamese Films

Dear Naomi Standen, dear List,

during the Berlinale (Berlin International Film Festival) this year a few Vietnamese films were shown that all deal with the Vietnam War. These films were THE highlight of the festival. This is a list of the films; if you follow the links you will find further information in English:

Ai xuoi van ly (The Long Journey):

http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum2001/filme/ai_xuoi_van_ly.html

Ben khong chong (Wharf of Widows)

http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum2001/filme/ben_khong.html

Chung cu (The Building)

http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum2001/filme/chung_cu.html

Doi cat (Sandy Lives)

http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum2001/filme/doi_cat.html

Vao Nam ra Bac (Heading South, Going North)

You might also have a look at: Hue-Tam Ho Tai (ed.), The Country of Memory. Remaking the Past in Late Socialist Vietnam. Berkeley: University of California Press, esp. Mark Philip Bradley's article "Contests of Memory: Remembering and Forgetting War in the Contemporary Vietnamese Cinema", pp.196-226.

Best,

Martin Grossheim

Dept. of Southeast Asian History and Society

Institute of Asian and African Studies

Humboldt University Berlin

Unter den Linden 6

D 10099 Berlin

Germany

Tel.: +49 30 2093 6639

Fax.: +49 30 2093 6649

E-mail: martin.grossheim@rz.hu-berlin.de

From smg7@cornell.edu Mon Nov 26 17:23:24 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 10:11:59 -0500 (EST)

From: smg7@cornell.edu

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Seeking Vietnamese films inquiry

Dear List members:

Dr. Standen sent me the msg shown below in response to my suggestion that I posted directly to her email account. THE POINT IS: Dr. Standen doesn't subscribe to this list (Shawn M indicated his initial post was a forward)! So she won't be able to read all your well intentioned contributions unless you at least CC to her account <naomi.standen@ncl.ac.uk> . Perhaps some of you have, but it seems not to be the case judging from her response to me.

Getting into cinema critiques is a welcome departure from this list's historiographical skew, in my strangelove viewpoint, but even that may not appeal to everyone who hangs out here. So let's at least make the bandwidth expenditure reach the inquirer.

Respectfully,

steve graw

Msg from Naomi Standen (11-12-01:

"Dear Steve,

Thanks for that UCLA info, and yes, I would very much like to see the replies to the Vietnam list. Perhaps you could also, at some point, pass on my thanks to

Shawn McHale for passing on my query to the real experts.

Best wishes,

Naomi

--

Naomi Standen

naomi.standen@ncl.ac.uk

+44 (0)191 222 6490

http://www.staff.ncl.ac.uk/naomi.standen

From kleinen@pscw.uva.nl Mon Nov 26 17:23:28 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 16:27:04 +0100

From: John Kleinen <kleinen@pscw.uva.nl>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: FWD: H-Asia: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

Maybe of some interest for the folks out there (the cinema remained rather marginal): published in Huynh Sanh Tong (ed), The Vietnam Review, March 1998, pp. 345-368 (Connecticut and Yale University)

THE VIETNAM WAR THROUGH VIETNAMESE EYES

A review of literary fiction and cinema by

John Kleinen and Cao Xuan Tu

From dnfox@hotmail.com Mon Nov 26 17:23:33 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 19:20:43 +0000

From: Diane Fox <dnfox@hotmail.com>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Vietnamese films inquiry--from a list member

Dear List:

Guilty as charged. However, I sent my message to the whole list because I know through separate discussions with several of you that hearing about what films are available is of general interest to many of us who teach, or can otherwise draw on them for our work.

So I hope--and am happy to see--that others will send what they have found to the list as well, and our knowledge can be expanded.

Thanks to all who sent suggestions--and an invitation to others, this time, from a list member.

Diane

From e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu Mon Nov 26 17:23:37 2001

Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2001 10:50:13 -0800

From: Erica Peters <e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

When I was doing research in Aix-en-Provence in 1997, the Institut de l'Image ran a film festival called "Vietnam: 1945-1997: La Guerre et apres" (The war and after). It featured a mix of French, American, and Vietnamese-made films. I have the brochure from that film festival, and could post it in its entirety if there's interest.

My favorite film of the ones I went to see was a Vietnamese film from 1996, directed by Hô Quang Minh (who was there in the room to present the film as well.) Its original title was listed as:

"Gate, Gate, Paragate" (a Buddhist mantra).

In French, its title was: "Parti, parti, parti, pour toujours"

In English, I believe it's called "Gone, gone, forever gone."

The film traced the period from 1945 - 1985 through the (fictional) lives of two brothers and their sister, split apart by the war. One brother fought for the north, the other rejected Communism, and their sister became a Buddhist nun. The film itself was beautiful, each season, each mood, each location, each drop of rain presented in loving detail.

The film was also memorable for how the Americans were portrayed -- as impossibly tall children. They tromped around in the bush, naive, killing people without understanding why. They were not portrayed as evil, but as terribly misguided. I believe the French were portrayed as more sinister, but I could be misremembering.

I've never heard of it since. I would think that I had dreamed the whole thing (the movie had a sort of surreal quality to it), except that I have the brochure in my hands. And now I've gone to look on Google and I find that it also was shown at least a couple of times in the US -- it was apparently submitted as VN's contender for the Academy Awards in 1997, according to the following web page:

<http://www.webcom.com/~sjfilm/97/catalog/gone.html>

It was in Vietnamese, and had French subtitles when I saw it. But the above-referenced web-page indicates at least that it exists or existed with English subtitles as well.

I have no idea how one would track it down. But it was truly beautiful, and moving. If anyone does know how to get a copy, please let me know.

The brochure also lists another VNese film which looks interesting:

Original title: "Hay Tha Thu Cho Em"

French title: "Pardonne-moi"

English title: "Please Forgive Me"

Director: Luu Trong Ninh

Produced: Vietnam - 1993

My brochure says: "Mai, an art-school student, is invited to play the principal role in a film about the American war. During the shooting, she falls in love with the director of the film, a war veteran. What she loves about him is his 'romantic past as a combatant.'"

Here is info about the film from the following website:

<http://www.thefileroom.org/FileRoom/documents/Cases/141luuTrongNinh.html>

>>> The film "Please Forgive Me" depicts the struggle of a soldier-turned-movie-producer trying to make a film glorifying Hanoi's war with the US by using Vietnamese actors and actresses born after the Communist victory in 1975. It explores the conflict between the older generation of Vietnamese, which romanticizes its role in "liberating" the country from foreign aggressors, and younger people, who are more fun- loving, consumer-oriented, and cosmopolitan. The older characters in the movie repeatedly criticize the country's youth for not appreciating the contribution of their parents generation, what they have bequeathed the country...

>>> "Please Forgive Me" was screened untouched by censors, but it was later banned. Ninh (the filmmaker) says he has been told he must cut four scenes before the movie can be shown again. Hano's keepers of artistic orthodoxy took umbrage because one of the characters declared that Vietnamese communist troops as well as US soldiers had commited acts of brutality during the war. Ninh also was asked to remove a scene in which a group of college students spoof the party's Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Association, declaring that it no longer exists in real life.

>>> Luu Trong Ninh is US$40,000 in debt due to a private loan taken out to produce the film, and therefore has stated that he will probably have to cut the scenes to lift the ban and repay his debts. >>>

Source: Murray Hiebert, Far Eastern Economic Review, July 22, 1993, pg. 90

Again, I have no idea how one would find this film. If anyone has suggestions for how to track down obscure films, that would be wonderful.

Erica

Erica J. Peters

Phone: (650) 938-4936

e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu

From dnfox@hotmail.com Mon Nov 26 17:24:16 2001

Date: Tue, 13 Nov 2001 01:02:46 +0000

From: Diane Fox <dnfox@hotmail.com>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

Thanks Erica. Yes, please count this as a vote for posting the entire brochure.

As for finding the films--what about contacting the film studio or the director, directly? I was surprised how easy that proved to be in the one case I tried, but don't know how generalizable that might be.

Again, many thanks.

--Diane

Subject: Vietnamese films inquiry

List members might be interested in a new publication relevant to this inquiry.

Film in South East Asia: Views From the Region, published by SEAPAVAA in association with the Vietnam Film Institute (Hanoi) and the National Screen and Sound Archive of Australia. Editor: David Hanan. 320 Pages and 60 illustrations.

This book presents, for the first time ever, via a series of individual essays, a broad panorama of the history of film in eight South East

Asian countries: the Philippines, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand,

Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia. It also provides succinct readings of the history of film in two countries in the neighbouring Asia-Pacific region, Australia and New Zealand. The essays in this volume also provide some sharp thumbnail sketches of recent developments in film in the countries of the region, in historical context.

The book is an initiative of SEAPAVAA (The South East Asia-Pacific Audio

Visual Archive Association) and represents an attempt to make it possible for people in these neighbouring countries to begin to have some sense of the film industries - and the history of the film industries and of film culture - in each other's countries. Most of the essays have been written by people in one way or another closely associated with the film world in their own country; in this sense the views presented here are not only views from the region, but the views of people who know their own national cinema very well. Because many of the essays in this book begin their accounts of cinema in their country at the high point of Western colonial penetration into South East Asia, and carry the stories forward through periods of turmoil leading to independent nationhood and the early years of a new nation, as well as to the present day, this book contains significant material about the social history of both colonial and immediately post-colonial periods.

HOW TO OBTAIN THIS BOOK:

If your institution wishes to obtain a copy of this book (approx $35), it can be ordered from the Marketing section of the National Screen and Sound Archive of Australia (aka Screensound), in Canberra, by sending an email to Jean.Wein@screensound.gov.au

From jsw7@columbia.edu Mon Nov 26 17:24:40 2001

Date: Tue, 13 Nov 2001 18:31:40 -0500

From: Jayne Werner <jsw7@columbia.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Re: Films for Vietnamese memories of war

Dear List:

On the film subject, the Asia Society here in New York had a film festival on Vietnamese films several years ago. One of the films the audience found moving was the American-war-time film, "When the l0th Month Comes." I believe this is a Dang Nhat Minh film. Evidently the film (in l0 mm format) came from the film "archives" at either UCLA or another Calif. campus, and is not available for circulation for educational purposes. I have often wondered when/if a research center specializing in Southeast Asia studies or the Vietnam War might serve as a clearinghouse for Vietnamese films. Cornell does this as an outreach function for some SEA films but not specifically for Vietnam films.

From e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu Mon Nov 26 17:24:53 2001

Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 11:20:04 -0800

From: Erica Peters <e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: Brochure from 1997 film festival

Hi all,

Below is the list of films from the brochure I mentioned. I should apologize up front for the lack of accents in French and Vietnamese. Also, I've generally listed the titles as they appear in the French program.

FESTIVAL: Vietnam, 1945 - 1997: La guerre et apres

Feb. 13 - March 2, 1997

Institut de l'Image

Aix-en-Provence, France

FRENCH FILMS:

La 317e section (1964)

La Republique est morte a Dien Bien Phu (1974)

Le fond de l'air est rouge (1977)

Dien Bien Phu (1991)

Indochine (1991)

Point de depart/Starting Place (1993) (made by an American director in France: Robert Kramer)

AMERICAN FILMS:

Apocalypse Now

Good Morning Vietnam

Casualties of War

Heaven and Earth

VIETNAMESE FILMS:

L'enfant de Hanoi (1974) dir. by Hai Ninh

Terre Devastee (Canh Dong Hoang) (1979) dir. by Nguyen Quang Sang

Quand la lampe s'eteint (Chi Dau) (1981) dir. by Pham Van Khoa

Poussiere d'Empire (1983) dir. by Lam Le

Troupe de cirque ambulant (Ganh Xiec-Rong) (1988) dir. by Viet Linh

Pardonne-moi (Hay Tha Thu Cho Em) (1993) dir. by Luu Trong Ninh

Cyclo (1994)

Parti, parti, parti pour toujours (Gate, Gate, Paragate) (1996) dir. by Ho Quang Minh

Nostalgie de la campagne (Tuong Nho Dong Que) (1996) dir. by Dang Nhat Minh

HONG KONG FILM:

A Bullet in the Head (1990) dir. by John Woo

DOCUMENTARY FILMS:

Technologie du genocide (USA - 1967)

La Sixieme Face du Pentagon (France - 1967)

Le Vietnam des femmes (1980)

Bambou-Saigon (France - 1970)

Vivre comme il faut (Chuyen Tu Te) (Vietnam - 1987), dir by Tran Van Thuy

Le 17e parallele (France - 1968)

Hanoi - Martes 13 (Cuba - 1967)

L.B.J. (Cuba - 1968)

79 Primaveras (Cuba - 1969)

OTHER:

Mickey au Vietnam (2 minute cartoon; Mickey Mouse goes to war in VN) (notdated)

There were also a number of roundtables, where historians, sociologists, novelists, film directors, and journalists gathered to discuss different aspects of Vietnam since 1945.

Erica

Erica J. Peters

University of Maryland University College

e-peters-9@alumni.uchicago.edu

From hhtai@fas.harvard.edu Mon Nov 26 17:24:59 2001

Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 15:15:32 -0500

From: Hue-Tam Ho Tai <hhtai@fas.harvard.edu>

Reply-To: vsg@u.washington.edu

To: Vietnam Studies Group <vsg@u.washington.edu>

Subject: VN War films

>List:

>I've just received a blurb from Firt Run/Icarus films for Gao Rang, a film

>by Claude Grunspan, featuring Vietnamese cameramen/soldiers who describe

>their experiences filming during the French and American wars. It

>features Mai Loc and Khuong (?) Me, veterans from the French war, and Tran

>van Thuy (of How to Behave) and Le Man Thich.

>The film is 52 mn long, and costs $390 ($75 for rental).

>Web: www.frif.com

>

>Hue-Tam Ho Tai