Tau ban no hoi

George Lam is a Japanese photojournalist whose assignment is in Viet Nam, shooting the people and events.... when the local authorities don't confiscate his film. As he goes on, he discovers the desperate poverty of the population; it's not about the Boat People, but more about the desperation that forces the people to, in the words of the Chinese title, "Flee towards the angry sea."

Shot just after the war between China and Viet Nam, that goes a long way towards why the authorities permitted Anna Hui and her Hong Kong crew to shoot on Hainan. It's a telling story, not the least because the director lets you know this is a pure point-of-view story; every shot is perfectly composed, often beautiful in its horror. Even after Lam abandons his camera, the beautiful images continue; he's trapped with his photographer's eye, seeing things as they really are, yet unable to see anything but the beauty of misery.

Every refugee from Vietnam I know has reported incidents depicted in this film. Nobody experienced all of them, and certainly not in the film's timespan, but none of the incidents are especially far-fetched.

Watching this now and although it is quite interesting, rather much has changed. Although we hoped that this would have been made in Vietnam but it is not at all and I'm sure the communist country must not have been so happy. Made by Hong Kong and on location in the Chinese island of Hainan which is rather well done but of course we really wanted to see Vietnam. Also we thought that we would see the 'boat people' but not really at all. In Chinese the title is literally, Run Towards the Angry Sea, which would have been much better although we do finally get to a boat. I know so little about Vietnam so it was pretty good for anything about this but it was so sad and violent. All the cast, including the Vietnamese and the rather naive Japanese cameraman were all Cantonese speaking people.

Like most Americans of draft age when the Vietnam War was raging, I promptly forgot about the hellish place once we were defeated there and I was no longer subject to getting my ass shot off for the likes of Diem. So this powerful film was a timely reminder for me, and I suspect others, that the country's sufferings did not exactly lessen under Communist rule. And while I have no doubt that there is more than a soupcon of anti Comm propaganda at work here this movie is a much needed antidote to the Jane Fonda fueled Ho Chi Minh worship so prevalent, to this day, among certain of my lefty friends. In short, the guy was a monster and so was his authoritarian and brutal government, and director Ann Hui allows you to miss none of it in this harrowing, bleak tale, albeit with a glimmer of hope at the end. I especially like how Hui effectively integrates the Japanese photo journalist into her story rather than, as in say "The Killing Fields", keeping the Saintly Newsperson above and beyond the horror while letting the lowly peasants bare the full brunt of the atrocities. I also like how how this director seems to have an innate sense of when to speed things up and when to slow them down as in the contemplative scenes involving the old revolutionary and his young/old mistress, scenes that seem to reach back beyond even the 1960s to the time of Graham Greene. So, to sum up, a most impressive work, and I hope to see more of this fine director's work. Give it an A minus.

I first watched Boat People when I was in high school about two decades ago. Today I watched it again with a heavy heart and totally new understanding. Although this movie is talking about the story of Vietnam, Chinese who know history can see it's also a story of China. And for Chinese, unfortunately, the history recur under the reign of the pretty soon emperor-to-be.......