Getting Hip to Hiep - An Interview with "Green Dragon" Actress Hiep Thi Le

07.13 - Posted by Editor

Getting Hip to Hiep An Interview with "Green Dragon" Actress Hiep Thi Le   A VC FilmFest 2001 report Interview by Chris Castillo

07.13.01 -- Hiep Thi Le, the star of "Heaven and Earth," returns to the screen with an emotional and powerful performance in Timothy Linh Bui's "Green Dragon" and acts and serves as producer on the horror film "Return to Pontianak." Chris Castillo interviewed the actress and producer at the VC FilmFest 2001.   AAF   How authentic is "Green Dragon"? Did any of it happen to your parents or anyone you know?   HTL  There is really no real correlation except that I was a boat child. I was not airlifted. I crossed the ocean with my younger sister. We didn't know we were fleeing from anything. We thought we were just going to look for our father, who was supposed to be across the river. Nevertheless, it went on and on and on, to China, to Hong Kong and who knows where else.   Links "Green Dragon" review -- post your responses!   AAF   So your parents told you it was an adventure?   HTL  Yes, I was six or seven years old and my sister was four or five. My mother just put us on a little raft out to sea and said go look for your father. We went, "Okay." We couldn't find our father but our only concern was that our mother would be disappointed that we couldn't find him. So that was our journey. Then we lived in refugee camps and we thought that it was a great place. There was free food, free clothes, and other kids to play with.   AAF   So you can identify with the kids on the movie?   HTL   Yeah, it was the same thing; we were looking for our parents. We wondered why they didn't show up. If they loved us, where were they? Were we just abandoned? We didn't think that was the case but adults and other kids were telling us all these horrible stories. However, we didn't see that kind of reality. We saw the ultimate reality. So to see the kid in "Green Dragon" playing with the fireworks during the Fourth of July, that was what my reality was like.   AAF   So how were you able to cope when reality set in?   HTL   Wow. The thing is four years later, I was reunited with the rest of my family. By then, I guess I grew up with a completely different philosophy of life. I had seen death everyday and was told that everything that happens will happen. Whatever was puzzling me at that point and time will completely reveal itself to me when the time is right. So I never really questioned anything and when my parents showed up, they showed up, and when they didn't, I knew there was a reason why. So to me, it was kind of different; I didn't have the intellect or the knowledge of how we were affected. It was just the immediate microscopic world of our family and me. I mean for me, the whole refugee camp experience was very similar.   AAF   Obviously you were a child then and there's no correlation to your adult role in the film. How did you prepare?   HTL   It started with research. You have to study the mentality of the elitist and the intellectual and the aristocrat of that period. That was the first wave of Vietnamese. They fled while the country was still at war. They had not lost the country yet but they went to another place and time because they had the intelligence to know that this country might not be safe. There is a completely different body language and speech pattern. It was completely different before and after the war. Therefore, I had to go to that mindset. My character Thuy was a law student but she never received her degree. The only thing that mattered to her was that she fled in order to protect her father, sister, and whatever is left of her family. After a while, that also fell apart. I could totally identify with the need for family. That was the core of my whole life. So to bring that to the screen was not too hard for me but the whole physical and concrete body language and speech pattern was more difficult.   AAF   One of the most powerful scenes was when your father died and you confronted Sgt. Lance and told him that America abandoned your country. Your dialogue was a microcosm of the whole war.   HTL   For me, I interpreted it as a woman who did everything she could to protect her family. At that point, she was torn between calling herself a failure and blaming someone else, which would have been easier.   AAF   When you were filming that scene, were you taking it personally? That America did abandon Vietnam?   HTL   I didn't really think of it that way. I was basically taking it as an internal struggle. I was thinking of what happened to this point. They promised us that everything would be safe and secure. It was all a big lie. It was the anger and frustration of that lie and of everything that I worked hard for to prove and was stopped. That was what I wanted to portray. The truth is all a lie. I wanted to show that more than saying that it was your fault. It was everybody's fault, but more importantly, it was the fault of the person that promised it.   AAF   How was it working with Timothy Bui who is a Vietnamese American director doing a Vietnamese story as opposed to the American film with Oliver Stone?   HTL   With Oliver, it was a general thing although it was a story of a particular woman. Oliver and I, we had decided that "Heaven and Earth" was a story about women. So whatever step or motivation I took, it has to stem from the fact that I was a woman under these circumstances. What would I do and how would I feel. While in "Green Dragon," it was the reverse. It was a personal story. This is I and this is what is happening to me, my family, and my country. This is how I would react. I was putting myself in the shoes of Thuy with that background and making it very, very microcosmic and individualistic on my motivation and in my reactions.   AAF   How about the sensibilities of the two directors when it came to their respective materials? Bui is younger and Oliver went to Vietnam. Is there a difference in the way the material was handled?   HTL   I think they both have their separate sensitivities. With Oliver, we talk about the average person who has never been exposed to those circumstances. We also talk about women who have lived those circumstances. It became like a true heroine, which was what I was trying to portray. I don't know if I was able to accomplish that. Whereas with "Green Dragon," it is to speak from a perspective of a Vietnamese woman and educate those who otherwise would not know what it means to be a Vietnamese woman under those circumstances. I tried to be as true to the character as I can be.   AAF   What do you want the audience to get from your character?   HTL   There is a difference between the message that the film is sending out and what I wanted to send out. I wanted the individual story to be what the Vietnamese woman is all about. She has to represent her country and under all circumstances. She has to be the backbone from both the political and the domestic point of view. She has to overlook all the obstacles and find a way conquer them. With Thuy, it was not about blaming other people but finding out what she had done wrong. She accepted the consequences of her action and she was able to prevail. Do not feel guilty for Thuy. I want the audience to realize that Thuy is a strong woman.   AAF   The state of Asian cinema has exploded but it seems like the Vietnamese filmmakers have been less well represented. Where do you see their place?   HTL   I think it's very hard for the Vietnamese Americans. In America, we have freedom of speech, religion, and practice. So here, you have the right and the left wing living under the same county. When you make a movie, you have to be careful; you might open some old wounds or create new ones where you never intended to. An extreme sensitivity has to be taken into consideration. That is why it is hard for us to make individual stories. There is always something lying underneath the Vietnamese pop culture. Until we push the envelope and are willing to accept the consequences, it is not going to happen.   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" (www.theskyisfalling.net) and in principal photography on the short film "Dream 1972". He serves as president of Cinegang, a Fil-Am collective of filmmakers and artists all over the U.S and Canada. He can be reached at catalystfilms@mediaone.net     Return to top