Home
Screenings/Events
News
Features
Reviews
Weekly Picks
Community
Message Boards
Commentary
Join the Army!
Resources
Filmmakers Network
Film Database
Casting Calls Board
Entertainment
Minute Movies
About the Site
Manifesto
Contact
Staff/Credits
|
|
 
The good and the bad
"Green Dragon" - directed by Timothy Linh Bui
06.09 - Posted by Editor
|
|
6.09.01 -- In 1975, Camp Pendleton Marine Base in San Diego became a small city, set up to house 100,000 Vietnamese immigrants displaced by the fall of Saigon. Director Timothy Linh Bui (brother of Tony "Three Seasons" Bui) has crafted an Altman-like world with "Green Dragon," a feature film exploring the trials and tribulations of the refugees, soldiers, and workers within the camp.
A young boy named Minh Pham (played with great sadness by Trung Nguyen) awakens in the middle of a sea of people lying side by side like sardines. With his sister, the boy searches the camp for his mother. Through their search, we meet an amalgam of characters, each with his or her own story and destiny. Placed in an alien world, the refugees have lost everything they had. Families, tradition, and culture are threatened or forgotten in a life turned upside down.
While Minh searches for his mother, a volunteer cook named Addie (Forest Whitaker, in a very emotional portrayal) befriends him. Although they can't speak each other's languages, they bond over their love for drawing... and Mighty Mouse. As the film progresses, their lives become intertwined through a mural that they paint together which fuses American and Vietnamese symbols – including the green dragon of the film's title.
Meanwhile, Minh's Uncle Tai Tran (another excellent performance by Don Duong, who played the pedicab driver in "Three Seasons") tries to reconcile his grief over the fact that he took the place of Minh's mother in the evacuation. He tells the children they'll be reunited with their mother, but he knows that soon they'll have to face the harsh truth. He befriends Staff Sergeant Jim Lance (Patrick Swayze, in a touching and eye-opening performance), and both men both struggle to make sense of the repercussions of the war. Lance grapples with feelings of ambivalence over what the United States has done to the Vietnamese, eventually equating their journey to his own as he comes to grips with the death of his brother in the war.
Bui deftly explores the effects of the camp on many different people. Thuy Hoa (Hiep Thi Le) tries to rebuild her life after the suicide of her father, who was a general in the South Vietnamese army. A mistress and a wife fight for dominance while trying to conquer the demons of their past lives. And while one man who wants to go back to find his family in Vietnam blames the Americans for everything, another refugee dreams of scoring it big by building Little Saigons in American cities.
The film sometimes feels generic and cleaned up. Somehow, everyone and everyplace in the camp looks so clean. But although "Green Dragon" sometimes falls into formulaic filmmaking and has other problems (the conclusion of the Forest Whitaker storyline feels particularly anti-climactic), the film succeeds in avoiding melodrama. As with Tony Bui's "Three Seasons," strong performances are the key to the film, and the actors pull us into their characters to make us feel their desperation and hope. The film portrays the Vietnamese not as victims, but as survivors. Bui doesn't make us feel sorry for the refugees, but instead celebrates their lives and encourages us to join them on their journey.
Chris Castillo is a writer/producer/filmmaker based in Los Angeles. He is currently in post-production on his feature length film "The Sky Is Falling" and in development on "Where The Willows Grow". He serves as president of Cinegang, a collective of Fil-Am filmmakers and artists all over the U.S and Canada. He can be reached at catalystfilms@attbi.com.
Just finished watching the movie. I had quite alot of anticipation after all the reviews and publicity. I should have known better. Again, it goes to prove the point that directors, or at least the good ones, should not try to float their own screenplays. Why do you think they pay writers in Hollywood?
The script for Green Dragon is just too lame and melodramatic. It is a pity, given the fact that there are so much literature out there about this type of characters and settings. I can list a few dozens Vietnamese novels and writers telling these same stories and experience over the last 25 years. Timothy Bui should have read a few of these, picked whichever he liked most, and turned it into a screenplay. It could have saved alot of time, and might have saved the movie. Again, directors should stick to making movies, and let writers do the writing.
Touching movie. Not really my type of movie, but still very touching. Hiep Thi Le was extremely good.
Below are comments to this review which have been moved over from the old site. Enjoy! -- Editor
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: Quoc Phu Pham
E-mail: Qppham@hotmail.com
Thank You Chris, for a great job, a great performance, the best Vietnam related movie ever been made. God bless U and your family. Pham
12/10/02 14:01
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: BAODUC
E-mail: entertainment@baoduc.com
Web Page: BAODUC ENTERTAINMENT
Green Dragon is a very good movie. It touched me so much to think of my homeland. DON DUONG - Great Actor! Wish you the best for your coming day!
09/10/02 05:01
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: BAODUC
E-mail: entertainment@baoduc.com
Web Page: BAODUC ENTERTAINMENT
Green Dragon is a very good movie. It touched me so much to think of my homeland. DON DUONG - Great Actor! Wish you the best for your coming day!
09/10/02 05:01
------------------------------------------------------------------------
|
|
|
