The Scent of Green Papaya (Tran, 1993): BFI Southbank, NFT1, 6.20pm
This 35mm presentation also screens on February 28th. Full details here.
Chicago Reader review:
A beautiful first feature (1993) by Vietnamese filmmaker Tran Anh Hung,
shot on a French soundstage and set in two bourgeois Saigon households
in 1951 and ’61. The central character, inspired by Tran’s mother, is a
servant girl, played as a ten-year-old by Lu Man San and as a young
woman by Tran’s wife, Tran Nu Yen-khe, and the main focus is on everyday
household chores and sensual discoveries, all made mesmerizing by
elaborately choreographed camera movements that link interiors and
exteriors in the same fluid itineraries. The first household contains an
unhappy family, the second a wealthy Europeanized composer, and,
perhaps significantly, only the first seems to have much connection with
the surrounding neighborhood. The Vietnam war is dealt with so
elliptically that it figures only as offscreen sirens and overhead
planes. This stylish period piece won the Camera d’Or at the 1993 Cannes
film festival and was nominated for an Oscar.
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Here (and above) is the trailer.
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