Viet and Nam

Quite an entrancing tale. Director Minh Quy Truong offers an interesting tale of queer romance, identity, and the spirit of the Vietnam landscape with gorgeous colors, sound designs, and poetic dialogue that lingers throughout the tale. Truong doesn't shy away from the slow-burn, yet, beautiful poetic nature of it's writing and atmosphere, establishing some wonderful shots, vibe and an interesting character observation between the two main leads.

The production designs, camerawork, and the nature performances really help out the story. There are some sequences that are still burned into my memory because of how beautiful and poetic the sequences are approached. The performances really evaluate the characters depth, conversations and the emotional engagement between them, which I find myself enjoying the characters and wanting to see their journeys together.

However, the only thing that prevents it from becoming a masterpiece is that there are a few pacing issues during the second act and the style does feel too similar towards Tsai Ming-liang and Apichatpong Weerasethakul. However, at the end of the day, it's still a visual experience.

Vietnam cinema isn't really discussed much but in recent times, more art-house filmmakers have been coming out. I'm glad to see more Vietnamese filmmakers coming into the light.

Walked out after an hour and wish I had left earlier. The scenes are choppy and seem to be spliced one after the other with no connection or flow. Absolutely no character development, making it hard to care, and the choice of deliberately unappealing images and settings throughout do not help. From the excruciatingly slow opening scene I should have realised that the director had no intention of immersing the viewer in the story. Unfortunately I gave it a full hour before walking out. Should you be in the need of an unappealing, very slow story that seems to go nowhere, this may be for you. If not I suggest you avoid this one.

I know that this is a drama film, but just because it's a drama, doesn't mean it has to be super long and super boring. That's what happened. It's unnecessarily long, filled with scenes of tedious daily chores and idle conversations. After several minutes, I lost my patience and started abusing the fast forward button. I stopped whenever there seems to be something going on. But as it turned out, it was just nothing. It seemed to me that the director is trying to be somewhat artistic, but doesn't know how to make an artistic work. That's why it looked out of order and boring. I tried to stay awake till the end to see the ending. But alas, the ending (as I have predicted) isn't good at all. Nope. No, sir. So glad I abused the fast forward button! So I didn't waste 2 hours of my life for this piece of nonsensical and pretentious work of so called art. Blerghh... And I've seen quite a number of pretentious ones. So dull and boring with no taste.

There is a lot of Viet and Nam that is good, very good. Many of the images and scenes this film gave to me will linger in my mind's eye forever. The overarching story is also basically solid and one I was willing to explore as I came to know the individual characters. Unfortunately, the editing and seemingly random and disparate jumps in time both backwards, forwards, and sideways made for a maddening viewing experience. Often times this structuring makes it difficult to engage with the story and characters. However, in spite of this I was still able to connect with these characters, care about their fates and was rooting for them. Which makes the challenging arrangement of its parts all the more frustrating. I'm not sure why the director decided to make Viet and Nam so difficult for the viewer, but despite this there are some moments and characters worth exploring for the patient and romantic amongst us.

"Leave the light on. It's easier for me to dream."

The opening shot of Viet and Nam, writer-director Truong Minh Quý's sophomore film, is a feat of cinematic restraint. Nearly imperceivable white specs of dust begin to appear, few and far between, drifting from the top of a pitch-black screen to the bottom, where the faintest trace of something can be made out in the swallowing darkness. The sound design is cavernous and close, heaving with breath and trickling with the noise of running water. A boy incrementally appears, walking gradually from one corner of the screen to the other. He has another boy on his back. A dream is gently relayed in voiceover. Then, without the frame ever having truly revealed itself, it's gone.

In between face-smashingly passionate makeout sessions Viet and Nam retrace their dreams in the still of the mine to swooning effect, and it feels like this is all happening in outer space, as if time is infinite, the boys' love eternal. Minh Quý's slow-cinema sensibilities are nothing short of spellbinding, the trance of rumination within reason enough to seek it out. And if that's not enough, go for the best final shot of the year: a breath-stealing beauty that will leave you frozen in your seat even after the credits are over.

Read full review on The Film Stage.