Vietnamese Films

On Vietnamese embroidery. In Vietnamese, English, and French.

On the handloom industry in Vietnam. In Vietnamese, English, and French.

A video documentary on the criminal procedure of Năm Cam and his 155 accomplices in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Subject(s): Organized crime --Vietnam, Criminal procedure --Vietnam.

This film about ‘tu-te’—human relations, fraternity, or kindness—explores troubling gaps between nationalistic slogans and Vietnamese life in a society that no longer seems able to define humanitarianism—or greed.

A short documentary by a Vietnamese filmmaker about a small community of opium addicts who live in caves in the mountains of Lai Chau. This film depicts Vietnamese government officials’ attempts to rehabilitate these people and reintegrate them into mainstream society.

The lives of Vietnamese revolutionary Ho Chi Minh and the Indonesian leader Sukarno reflect the nationalist movements in those former colonies of Western powers. The series surveys the past 150 years of economic and political development in the Pacific Basin; emphasizing the interconnections between Pacific nations -- and between those nations and the United States -- within a geographical, cultural, and historical framework.

Collapsing prices on the world coffee market have thrown millions growers around the world into poverty. Plantation owners are bankrupt, and field workers are starving. Filmed in Nicaragua and Vietnam, this documentary illustrates the human consequences that the collapse of coffee prices has caused in producer markets.

This lively film allows us to view contemporary Vietnamese life through the unique perspective of the role of rice in culture. In the breathtakingly beautiful countryside, rice farmers work diligently and worry incessantly about their crop. In Ho Chi Minh city, talented cooks prepare a fabulous variety of rice dishes for street vendors and fancy restaurants.

Documents the suffering, loss, and rebirth of the Cambodian people in the aftermath of the take over of Cambodia by Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge revolutionary forces and the subsequent invasion of Cambodia by Viet Nam.

Desperately poor, many people in the border town of Mong Cai have turned to smuggling to make ends meet. To combat the illegal trade, an elite unit of Vietnamese police officers struggles to enforce customs and tax laws.

Filmmaker Trinh T. Minh-ha explores the role of Vietnamese women historically and in contemporary society. Through the use of dance, printed texts, folk poetry, and the words and experiences of Vietnamese women in Vietnam, both North and South, and the United States, official culture is challenged by the voices of women. The documentary is a theoretically and formally complex work that explores the difficulty of translation, critiquing both traditional society.

Van Hoa New Magazine interviews Nguyẽ̂n Cao Kỳ, former Prime Minister of South Vietnam.

Vietnamese American university professor Hien Duc Do returns to his homeland for the first time since 1975. After interviewing a diversity of people from major cities and rural areas, he depicts this country’s dilemma of having to choose between Western capitalism and the legacy of war, yielding insights seldom encountered in the American media.

Viet Nam suffers from a peculiar contradiction: it receives too much water in the countryside and too little in the cities. This video shows how current development projects are working to resolve this water paradox.

20 years after the fall of Saigon, journalist John Pilger returns to Vietnam. He finds the nation invaded by multinational corporations eager to exploit cheap labor. As it struggles to provide a decent life for its people, Vietnam faces yet another battle.

Thirty years ago, the only future that awaited young Vietnamese was war. Today, Vietnam's first post-war generation is coming of age. This film profiles these young adults, who are seizing opportunities that their parents could not have imagined--flocking to cities, seeking higher education, and pursuing their dreams in an increasingly open economy. Yet this generation is tradition-bound, with family and community still the unshakable foundation of society.

This documentary examines the economic and social significance of the motor bike, the most common form of transportation in Ho Chi Minh City. Though common, motor bikes are also expensive luxury items. The decision whether to scrimp, save, or borrow to obtain such a status symbol can be wrenchingly difficult.

Describes the effects of Vietnamese economic policies on the daily lives of the Vietnamese peoples and shows the long-term effects of the war years.

An inside look at the last generation of Vietnamese to remember the horrors of the Vietnam War and the first to hope for an end to the country's isolation by increasing trade and communication with the West. These young adults still embrace the old ways, living with their extended families in houses warmed by firewood and without running water, but they also enjoy American pop music and Western sports like football.