Green Dragon

Engrossing depiction of the many trials and sorrows of the 1970's Vietnamese reufugees. Forest Whitaker gives a telling performance as a cook who bonds with a Vietnamese boy.

Along Southern California's coast, midway between Los Angeles and San Diego, sprawls Camp Pendelton, home to about 50,000 U.S. Marines. Less than an hour's drive to the north, not far from Disneyland, is a Vietnamese enclave of about 200,000 without political boundaries which the road signs call "Little Saigon". "Green Dragon" peers into the lives of a handful of Vietnamese who, in 1975 during the fall of Saigon, occupied a refugee camp at Camp Pendelton and went on to be assimilated into American society and establish communities such as "Little Saigon".

Part history lesson and part drama, "Green Dragon" is sensitive look at a people in flux agonizing over their expatriation and fragmentation while coming to grips with an uncertain future. The film is a somewhat uneven and austere hodgepodge with the look of a low budget indie. However, what it lacks in embellishments it makes up for in nobility of purpose and should be appreciated by those with a special interest in the time and the people involved. (C)

This film went beyond anything I had ever expected it to be. The acting was incredible, the scenes were moving and the characters memorable and beautiful. I was so happy to see Patrick Swayze back and looking good and of course Forest Whitaker was fabulous. His relationship with the young Mihn was touching. Please, go rent this movie; you won't regret it.

10/10*

I honestly do not understand why this movie is getting the kind of reviews it is getting.

The acting was brilliant in all fields, I found the little boy who play Minh's character amazing, especially for that age.

Very touched by the stories of every individual just because they where in a camp away from all the war doesn't mean the war is not there(including Swayze's and Whitaker's charterers of course). I found that the story to bring out a different part of the Vietnam war that is constantly looked over, well every war for that matter.

Strictly a movie that is about people life story. I keep seeing reviews how they felt it was an "Anti-American" film because of a few scenes... Honestly the movie about the emotions of the people who is not in their home country that is being torn up from their own people, and their only way out is to live in a camp that is completely foreign. Try to comprehend that.

This is a very good movie and it is worth a watch.

I would recommend this movie to anyone who would like an accurate perspective of the South Vietnamese people. Unlike the previous critic, I will leave any misinformed politics aside. Although the war was highly political, and the movie does comment on the war, the film is not based on any political agenda like the previous critic leads you to believe. Instead, I believe the movie's focus is on the human stories of people struggling to forge a new life after their country was taken away from them. What is refreshing and what gives the movie credibility is that the director and most of the actors are Vietnamese, many of whom went through similar experiences as depicted in the movie after the war. In that sense, the movie is real, not just some form of propaganda "intended for the not-too-bright oversentimental without-a-dose of a history-lesson or critical thought Americans." It is a movie for Americans, Vietnamese immigrants such as myself, and people who dare regard the United States as the great and imperfect hope that it is.