2023 edition

Glorious Ashes

Bui Thac Chuyen | 2022 | 117 | Drama 

In the coastal village of Thom Rom, the camera follows the lives of three women, whose love lives are unusual, as they try to keep their husbands at all costs. The film is told from Hau’s perspective, as she experiences her life with a husband who only has eyes for another woman. This continues until she strikes up a friendship with her rival. Images of fire and ashes appear throughout the film as a metaphor for the passion and longing of these women. 

Bùi Thạc Chuyên is an independent film director and screenwriter known for his TV series 12A and 4H, his short film Night Ride and his films Adrift, Living in Fear , Blood Curse and Glorious Ashes. All four films won national and international film awards, in addition to helping him win Best Director awards at the 2005 and 2023 Kite Awards, and also at the 16th Vietnam Film Festival. 

2022 edition  

Blood Moon Party

Tiec Trang Mau | 2020 | 118′ | Drama, Comedy 

Four childhood friends and their wives get together for dinner. After a heated discussion about the influence of cell phones on their personal lives, the group proposes a night game. Everyone is forced to place their cell phones on the table; and whoever receives a text message, notification or call must share it with the group. This seemingly harmless game will soon become a weapon of destruction revealing secrets that impact interpersonal relationships.

Nguyễn Quang Dũng (1978, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam) is a film director, screenwriter and producer. Son of writer Nguyen Quang Sang, from a young age he was associated with celebrities from the art world, such as musicians Trinh Cong Son and Van Cao and poet Nguyen Duy. This filmmaker is best known for films such as, Kiss of Death (2008), The Lady Assassin (2013) and Brilliant May (2018). 

2020 edition  

 Goodbye Mother

Trinh Dinh Le Minh | 2019 | 100 | Drama 

Van, heir to a Vietnamese clan, returns home from the United States for the first time in 9 years to help move his father’s grave. He surprises the whole family when he arrives accompanied by Ian, a young Vietnamese American. No one knows that Ian is Van’s fiancé and the two plan to tell Van’s mother, Mrs. Hanh, who expects her son to marry and become a father to fulfill his duty as heir. To make matters worse, his grandmother, who has senile dementia, mistakes Ian for her grandson. While desperately searching for the perfect occasion to come out of the closet, Van discovers that Mrs. Hanh is gravely ill. 

Trinh Dinh Le Minh is an emerging filmmaker from Vietnam. His narrative short film The Scent of Fish Sauce (2014) has toured prestigious film festivals such as the Palm Springs International Film Festival, the BFI London Film Festival and the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival. His first feature film, Goodbye Mother (2019), has screened at the Busan International Film Festival and the Hawaii International Film Festival. 

Mekong 2030

Anocha Suwichakornpong, Kulikar Sotho, Anysay Keola, Pham Ngoc Lan, Sai Naw Kham | 2020 | 93 | Drama 

The Mekong River is one of the main arteries of Southeast Asia. It is a source of life for a huge ecosystem, and for millions of people who depend on it for their livelihoods; it is also of great cultural importance to the diverse communities that settle along its banks. However, phenomena such as overfishing, climate change, hydroelectric projects, unsustainable development, and destructive agricultural practices threaten the river’s existence. MEKONG 2030 is the result of a project that brings together five directors who tell fictional stories set in the year 2030, inviting the audience to the conservation of this great source of life. In its 4880km journey, the eighth largest river in the world crosses six countries and their cultures: China, Burma, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, until it flows into the China Sea. The Mekong is the silent witness of all the bilateral and multilateral conflicts that have taken place in the area. 

Kulikar Sotho (Cambodia), Anysay Keola (Laos), Sai Naw Kham (Myanmar), Anocha Swichakornpong (Thailand) and Pham Ngoc (Vietnam) are the authors of this great project that attempts to bring together representatives of these countries to create a common story for all of them. 

2019 edition 

Father and Son

Lu’o’ng Dinh Dung | 2017 | 90 | Drama 

Living by the river, Moc is a rural Vietnamese fisherman who raises his son Ca in harmony with the land, earning his living by fishing every day. Ca has a yellow chick as a friend and likes to run after the airplanes that cross the sky every day, which he calls “city birds”. One day, Ca falls seriously ill and, in order to seek treatment, Moc and his son must make a harrowing trip to the city. The film screened at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2017 and the Indian International Film Festival 2017. It also won Best Asian Film at the Fajr Film Festival 2018 and Best Screenplay at the Vietnam Film Festival 2017. 

Dung Luong Dinh is a director, producer and writer with a master’s degree in film art from the Hanoi Film and Theater Academy. His short film “The Boatman” won the Best Film Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival 2007 and his short film “Red Happiness” won the Merit Award given by the Vietnam Film Association. “Father and Son” is his first feature film. 

Song Lang

Leon Le | 2018 | 101 | Drama  

Saigon, 1980s. Linh Phung is the star of a traveling cai luong (traditional folk opera) troupe and is deeply in debt to a moneylender named Dung, “Thunderbolt.” Despite seemingly having nothing in common, the two strike up a relationship playing a video game and discover that they think similarly and have many points of connection. Linh Phung knows that a life well lived is necessary for his art and Dung longs for art to return to a life more worth living. The story, rooted in fatalism and fatality, is inspired by the classic narrative structure of Vietnamese opera. The film screened at the Göteborg Film Festival 2019, the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2018 and the Hawaii International Film Festival 2018, and won the Tokyo Gemstone Award at the Tokyo International Film Festival 2018. 

Born and raised in Saigon, Leon Le moved to the United States as a teenager and is a dancer, singer and actor. “Song Lang”, his first feature film, can be considered a very mature work, resulting from personal experience committed to his vocation, uniting his sensibility as a photographer and that of an actor. 

Important Vietnamese films from 1992

 The Scent of Green Papaya

Tranh Ang Hung | 1993 | 104 | Drama  

In 1951, a young Vietnamese girl arrives at a Saigon household as their new servant. 

The Lover

Jean- Jacques Annaud | 1992 | 115 | Drama  

Trailer: https://youtu.be/0U55vtc3uOE 

SHE GAVE HER INNOCENCE, HER PASSION, HER BODY. THE ONE THING SHE COULDN’T GIVE WAS HER LOVE. 

A poor French teenage girl engages in an illicit affair with a wealthy Chinese heir in 1920s Saigon. For the first time in her young life she has control, and she wields it deftly over her besotted lover throughout a series of clandestine meetings and torrid encounters. 

The Third Wife

Ash Mayfair | 2018 | 96 | Drama 

Trailer: https://youtu.be/P7CSaxXFRkA 

Though only 14 years old, May is selected to be the third wife of a wealthy landowner. Her new home seems idyllic, her husband favours her, and she quickly becomes pregnant with what she is certain will be the desired male progeny. But trouble is quietly brewing: she witnesses a forbidden tryst that will spark a chain reaction of misfortunes — and stir in May urges that until now had been dormant.