(VOVworld)- The 7th European-Vietnamese Documentary Film Festival has concluded in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City giving the audience a chance to experience different cultures. Many of the screened films were prize winners at international film festivals. They truly and excitingly reflect the world, its changes. Ngoc Nga reports.
Patricio Guzman, a Chilean documentary film director, once stated that a country without documentaries is like a family without photo albums. His statement was once again shown to be true at the 7th European-Vietnamese Documentary Film Festival. Screening the film “Truong Sa-Vietnam” at the event, Vietnam wanted to affirm its sovereignty and determination to defend its sea and islands. Vietnam’s other featured films include “A drop in the ocean” which depicts the life and revolutionary career of General Vo Nguyen Giap, “Countryside”, a film about the material and spiritual lives of rural areas in the market-economy period, and “12 reaches of the Red River”, a film describing people’s lives on the Red River. Pham Thi Tuyet, Director of Vietnam’s National Documentary and Scientific Film Studio says the festival created a dialogue between European and Vietnamese documentaries as well as between generations of documentary film makers: “There is not a so-called “old film making style”. Documentary makers of different generations have their own ways to make films but it’s important that how they choose their topics and ways of reflection. At this year’s festival, old documentaries including the 1998 “The Sound of the Violin in My Lai”, the 2001 “Homeland” and 2005’s “Lasting with the time" brought an excellent program to the audience. There are also many films that were made last year”.
While Vietnamese history, culture and society are the themes of Vietnamese documentaries, European film makers chose personal projects for their work. There are stories about genders, family, and even a journey to explore someone’s identity. Each film is a unique story about a specific person and their personal life. They include “Sound of Heimat”, a German film about a journey inspired by a passion for folk music, “The good son”, and “Imperfect boundary”, films from Israel and Denmark that address issues of gender and identity as they portray the lives of two young people outside the normal gender boundaries. Doctor Almuth Meyer Zollitsch, Director of the Goethe Institute in Vietnam is one of the festival organizers. She said the difference between European and Vietnamese documentaries created an interesting dialogue between two genres of film: “At this festival, there is a dialogue about ways of making films. There are films with commentaries introducing the content of the films and films without commentaries and characters who tell their stories. There is also a dialogue about film topics. While Vietnamese and Asian films feature national identities, culture, people and the homelands, European films focus on personal identities and the journeys to affirm those identities”.
The documentary genre has in recent years enjoyed ever increasing popularity worldwide. The 20 outstanding foreign and Vietnamese documentaries at this festival show different perspectives and expressions of real life as well as showing the different views and styles of Vietnamese and European film makers. Famous German documentary film Director Arne Birkenstock said the open and genuine view of the world offers viewers an opportunity to gain an understanding of diverse realities and cultures through images: "As I said before, Vietnam is a country in transition,
therefore, it is an excellent place to make thrilling, entertaining and
intelligent documentary films about. It has to do documentary for
making, first of all, with good story telling, not just having
interviews and putting imagine, but really develop a story, develop a
dynamic for the story people want to tell"
After 7 years, the annual European-Vietnamese Documentary Film Festival has helped narrow the gap between Vietnamese and foreign film makers. The festival has become an interesting meeting place for audiences.