A Touch Of Life

3 min / color video
USA 2007
Director : Tuan Nguyen
The surreal and real mix together to create an
ambiance of beauty and peace.

The Finished People

The Finished People is a drama/semi-documentary about troubled life on the street. Set in the heart of south-western Sydney, this film features the story of the three young people who struggle to pass through the days with no bright future.

Although the film consists of a cast of young actors appearing on screen for the first time, their performances are compelling. It is a powerful film where the characters stay with you even after the film ends. Van, a 20-years-old teenager, would rather sleep in the car park than at home due to conflicts with his dad. Van is depressed and does not see what the future will bestow on him. One day he meets Carla while stealing a shirt from her clothesline. Instead of reprimanding Van for stealing, Carla offers him a jacket. In turn, Van starts to change as their relationship deepens. When things get better for Van, however, he finds out a hidden truth about Carla that leaves him devastated. Having used drugs since he was 13, Tommy’s fight with addiction is not easy for him to overcome. After a friend’s death, Tommy tries to get clean and start his life over. With the help and support from Sara, Tommy’s childhood friend, he begins hunting for a job. After several unsuccessful interviews, Tommy is left with disappointment and depression, which leads him on the road of addiction once again. At 17, Des not only has to take care of himself but his pregnant girlfriend, Sophie, as well. Although Des is the type of person who runs away from his problems, he insists on staying with Sophie so that they can raise their child together. He does not want to become like his dad who had abandoned his mother and him. Despite these efforts, he soon finds out that being a responsible husband and father is not an easy job. He fails at every attempt to find a job. In desperation, he joins a gang and works for a local drug dealer.

This film establishes a sense of place on the streets of Cabramatta for these hopeless wandering souls. It also demonstrates one idea: people go on with their lives, good or bad. Although these three young people’s circumstances are different, they are connected in their struggle with poverty. Because of the lack of opportunity that is afforded to them, their grueling lives worsen, even as they strive to change for the better.
- Helena Tran

Austrailia / 2003 / 80 min / 35 mm color
Producer: Post 75 productions
Director : Khoa Do
Writers: Khoa Do, Rodney Anderson, Joe Le, Jason McGoldrick
Cinematographers : Oliver Lawrance, Murray Lui
Sound: Julius Chan, Rainier Davenport
Music: Abigail Hatherley
Editor : Alison Croft
Main Cast: Rodney Anderson, Viet Dang, Mylinh Dinh, Anh Do, Daniela Italiano, Steve Kourouche, Joe Le, Mirian Marquez, Sam MacDonald, Jason McGoldrick, Ivan Topic, and Sarah Vongmany

The Love Market

52 min / color video
Australia 2008
Director : Shalom Almond
In the highlands of North Vietnam lies the remote town of
Sapa, home to a mosaic of colorful hill tribes. Sapa opened
to tourism in the late 1990’s and now roughly 200 hill tribe
girls aged 7-18 years live independently on the streets
of Sapa to sell embroidery. A few years ago Australian
filmmaker, Shalom Almond, visited Sapa as a tourist and
became friends with four Hmong girls. The girls are savvy,
street smart and dream of life beyond selling souvenirs.
But how will these young girls survive the leap from
remote tribal culture to 21st century Asia? Over the next
three years Shalom returns to Vietnam with her camera to
find out.

Match Made

48 min / color video
USA 2006
Director : Mirabelle Ang
Each day, men from various parts of Asia make a stop in Ho
Chi Minh City (Saigon) where they embark on their search
for a perfect match. Using verité footage and interviews,
Match Made offers a glimpse into the intricate network of
the buying and selling of women as brides from villages
around Saigon.

It’s Also A Life

12 min / color video
USA 2008
Director : Nguyen Dinh Thang
This documentary tells the story of 261 Vietnamese workers
trafficked to Jordan, where they were exploited, abused,
beaten, and humiliated. After being rescued by international
organizations, 156 of them have returned home to face a
grim future.

Never Perfect

Never Perfect explores the complex journey of a young Vietnamese American woman’s struggle with
popular perceptions of beauty and body image as she fights the stigma of racial self-hatred in her
decision to undergo cosmetic surgery. In 1982 her family left behind a tight-knit Vietnamese community
for the suburban sprawl of California , U.S.A. Now 27-years-old, having been reared amidst a backdrop
of American malls, movies and magazines and living in the same suburban house in which she was
raised, Mai-Anh challenges her self-diagnosed “quarter-life crisis” by way of a“ new location, new
lifestyle, new look.”
She begins a literal and symbolic transformation and reinvention of herself: a relocation from quiet
suburbia to the heart of urban Los Angeles, a new lifestyle defined by living on her own for the first
time, and finally, a new physical makeover: double eyelid surgery only days after starting her new life.
But will she find the answers to her crisis on the operating room table?

USA / 2007
65 min / color video
Producers : Regina Park, Edward Robinson, Jr.
Director / Editor : Regina Park
Cinematographer : Edward Robinson Jr.
Music: Asian Crisis, Henry Hung
Main Cast: Mai-Anh Tran

Blindness Series

Blindness Series: Kore

17 min / 1994
Tran T. Kim Trang / USA
Kore is a project which investigates the conjunction of sexuality
with 1) the eye as purveyor of desire; 2) the sexual fear and fantasy
of blindness and the blindfold; and 3) women and AIDS. Can the
blindfold embody a touch-based pleasure associated with female
sexuality, in contrast with a vision-based pleasure assigned to
male sexuality? Can the choice to not-see facilitate ecstasy for the
subject? How do fear and fantasy contrast with the reality of vision
loss in the advanced stages of AIDS?

BLINDNESS SERIES: Operculum

14 min / 1993
Tran T. Kim Trang / USA
This experimental documentary juxtaposes footage from visits with seven
cosmetic surgeons specializing in blepharoplasty (eyelid surgery) within the
Beverly Hills/West Hollywood area with text describing a 1950’s lobotomy
procedure to treat hysterical patients. This juxtaposition comments on
cosmetic surgery as a ‘desperate cure’. Blepharoplasty on Asian women
is regarded as a self-effacing fantasy of attaining the standard of beauty,
a standard that demands conformity to the norm. The artist poses as a
potential patient in consultation with the seven cosmetic surgeons.

Oh Saigon

Saigon Ơi

57 min / color video
USA 2007
Director : Doan Hoang
The last family that was airlifted out of Saigon at the end of
the Vietnam War attempts to resolve its divided past. Three
brothers, one capitalist, one communist, and one anti-war
meet again after decades and confront their differences.
Meanwhile, two first generation Vietnamese American sisters
try to reconcile a difficult past that had altered the course of
their lives: one was airlifted out of Saigon at the end of the
war, while the other was left behind and suffered kidnapping
and imprisonment.

Days on the Shore

Biệt Ly

7 min / color video
Denmark 2008
Director : Alfred Nguyen
In 1975 the communist regime in North Vietnam came to
power in South Vietnam and the countries were united
after 20 years of separation. In the following years, several
hundred thousands of people fled and many of them ended
as boat refugees in their journey for a new life without
oppression.
Our protagonist and his family are amongst these people.
Together with a handful of other refugees, the boat is their
only chance to flee. But they do not get far before they are
run down by a patrol boat. A confrontation is inevitable…

Sad Fish

Sầu Ngư

Sad Fish is an impressive second feature for this young filmmaker whose work is anything but
conventional. In this film, director Le-Van Kiet experiments with a non-linear, improvised
script (yes, I said “improvised” à la Richard Linklater’s Before Sunrise). Yet, it feels so natural that
it is difficult to imagine how it could be better with scripted dialogue. Although most of us
have already seen three of the four main characters in title roles of other films, this time, their
acting feels completely different from anything they have done before. Most of them have
been type-casted for certain roles; however, Sad Fish will shatter your preconceptions of how
these actors have performed in the past.
Building on his last film, Dust of Life [Bui Doi], Kiet continues to deal with stories rooted within
the Vietnamese American community in Little Saigon, but this time, he talks about the even
darker side of our community, masked by the Mercedes-driving, Banana-Republic-wearing,
American-dream-living good folks who — behind this façade — have surmounting debts and
live a life of loneliness and desperation.
Set in present-day Little Saigon, Sad Fish follows four characters who have suffered a kind of
loss and for whom this is (or appears to be) their final day existing in their current state. They
are almost trapped in their glass-bowl worlds looking out, and yet, unable to reach the other
world they see—much like fish in an aquarium. An older woman (Kieu Chinh from Face and
Journey from the Fall) resolving to die on this particular day, leaves her home and all of her
worldly possessions behind to journey on an existential path to her expected “death.”
A foreign-exchange student (Orchid Lam Quynh from the “Asia” music series) is desperate to
stay in the U.S. at any cost, except by actually working hard. A failed real-estate agent (Long
Nguyen from Green Dragon and Journey from the Fall) loses his job and his sanity, but still has
his wits about him. Finally, a young man (Jayvee Mai from The Anniversary and Journey From
the Fall) is forced to confront a secret he has kept in the closet. Their four separate paths
converge to an emotionally tense ending, when everyone’s true limits are tested and where
truth and real life is never black or white.
- Tram Le

USA / 2009
90 mins / color video
Vietnamese with English subtitles
Producers: Jayvee Mai, Le-Van Kiet
Director : Le-Van Kiet
Writers : Jayvee Mai, Long Nguyen, Le-Van Kiet
Cinematographers : Andy Vu, Le-Van Kiet
Editor : Ngoc Ho, Andy Vu, Le-Van Kiet
Main Cast : Kieu Chinh, Long Nguyen, Orchid Lam Quynh, Jayvee Mai

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