From Hollywood to Hanoi

For those of us who dread another terse journalistic foray into Vietnam's war-torn heart of darkness, relax! From Hollywood To Hanoi takes us on a positive journey that is both refreshing and revealing.

The filmmaker, Tiana Alexandra, left her homeland as a youngster after her father, the Minister of Media for President Diem's southern regime, lost confidence in his government. The family resettled in Virginia – far from Saigon's bomb-rattled windows and burning monks. But America's Utopian promise did not settle Tiana's restless soul.

Despite her blossoming success as an actress in Hollywood, and her father's admonitions not to return to the communist stronghold, Tiana ventured back to her forbidden homeland. Her unswerving curiosity leads us on a journey deep into the heart and soul of Vietnam: a land whose people were battered by history, yet never lost the intrinsic core of their forgiving culture.

At the end of her odyssey, Tiana uses the weapons of love and poetry to open the doors and hearts of her father's dreaded northern enemies. The hydra-headed communist monster purrs like a kitten in Tiana's hands, putting us in touch with the softer side of feared leaders like Pham Van Dong, Le Duc Tho, and Ho Chi Minh's military mastermind, General Vo Nguyen Giap. We can all learn from their sincere messages of peace, tolerance and reconciliation.

Just rewatched From Hollywood to Hanoi, and I'm still deeply moved. Tiana's journey is both personal and profound, offering an intimate look at Vietnam's past while exploring themes of reconciliation and identity. The way she weaves her own experiences with the stories of those she meets creates such an emotional depth-it really makes you reflect on history in a way that's rarely shown. The interviews are raw, the visuals are stunning, and the storytelling is so heartfelt. This isn't just a documentary; it's a deeply human experience that stays with you long after the credits roll. If you haven't seen it yet, it's definitely worth watching!

Coming to "From Hollywood to Hanoi" after so much history has been added to the stories of the United States and Vietnam since the end of the war between them, one is struck both by how prescient the film was on its 1992 release as well as how optimistic its filmmaker, Tiana Thi Thanh Nga, was when she made it. On one level, the documentary about a Vietnamese-American woman trying to untangle the twisted strands of her bi-national life is a universal quest for self and homeland. On the other, it's an absolution of America spoken without rancor by the people who were attacked by the greatest military force on earth. One expects that any film about Vietnam -- and certainly one that features Vietnamese people remembering the war -- would automatically be an indictment of the people who waged it (Gen. William Westmoreland, Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, Secretary of State Robert McNamara and the special interests whose water they carried). But that doesn't happen. Instead, Tiana -- whose father was press liaison for South Vietnam and remained a staunch Conservative until his death -- draws compassionate, even hopeful statements from the people that the bombs fell on. She is a winning screen interlocutor, a knowledgeable guide, and a dynamic Everywoman who unites rather than divides. I saw the film when it was originally released and found it a compelling character study. Seeing it again after some twenty years -- and after the death of General Vo Nguyen Giap, the architect of North Vietnam's defense strategy -- I am struck by how much has changed and, with regret, how much has not. The tiny nation that America could not conquer by force has instead being conquered by business. It's the people on both sides want to make peace; their governments still haven't come fully around. Maybe they should all see the remarkable "From Hollywood to Hanoi" again.

A revealing, sometimes disturbing, heartfelt glimpse at early '90s Vietnam, from the viewpoint of a most interesting individual—a personality whose rich and fascinating path back to her native homeland, nearly threatens to outshine the narrative detailing the tremendously dramatic, cultural and political landscape of the war-torn country.

Interviews with family living in both America and Asia, politicians and military leaders from each country, and biracial offspring produced by the war (either transplanted to the US, or abandoned by GIs in Vietnam), provide poignant insight and perspective from both sides.

Equally impressive is the surprisingly neutral tone presented by the director (considering obvious personal connections)—diplomatically, and yet somehow inherently subversively allowing viewpoints to air with a viscerally provocative, journalistic lack of judgment, that empowers the audience to form their own opinions.

I find this to be a very interesting film, first because of my time in Viet Nam and second because it explores the thoughts and feelings of a young woman from Viet Nam who returns to find her roots. The film is a record of her visit, post war, over the objection of her father. She makes contact with the family left behind and takes a no holds barred look at conditions of the country she left as a child. A wonderful expose of what it means to be a refugee and to return to the home of one's birth even though the native country and the adopted country are at odds. This film transcends politics but doesn't shy from them as it looks at culture of those left behind and those who have moved on to a new life. I think that everyone should view this film and get a feel of what it means to have been a child of a long, controversial war.