Vietnamese movie to be screened at Locarno Film Festival

The Unseen River will be available online, free of charge, on platforms of the Locarno Film Festival with unrestricted worldwide access in order to reach the widest possible audience.

The short film tells the story about Nguyen Minh Chau, a woman travelling upstream to find a lover she hasn’t seen in 30 years, and is told alongside a story of a young couple travelling downstream to a strange temple in search of a cure for chronic insomnia.

A scene from The Unseen River directed by Pham Ngoc Lan (Photo courtesy of MEKONG 2030 project)

Through carefully crafted cinematography and dialogue, the film examines the metaphorical connection between the Mekong River, time and sleep.

Lan is the director and producer of short films such as Blessed Land (2019), Another City ( 2016) and The Story of Ones (2011).

“The message of my film is the relationship of people to the river,” said Lan.

“It affects the way that people think, not only from the present, but also from the past. The attachment to the river is not something we can separate.”

Produced by the Luang Prabang Film Festival (LPFF), The Unseen River is one of five short films from the MEKONG 2030 anthology, a collection of narratives that envision the future of the Mekong River from different national and cultural perspectives within the region.

It will also be screened with MEKONG 2030 online at the Krakow Green Film Festival from August 16-23, Kota Kinabalu International Film Festival from September 5-12 and in theatres at Five Flavours in Warsaw from November 25 to December 2.

MEKONG 2030 anthology was born out of an urgent need to shine a light on the challenges faced by the Mekong River. Set in the year 2030, the narratives aim both to entertain and inspire audiences to actively protect this critical life source.

The other four short films in MEKONG 2030 include Soul River (director Kulikar Sotho, Cambodia), The Che Brother (director Anysay Keola, Laos), The Forgotten Voices of the Mekong (director Sai Naw Kham, Myanmar) and The Line (director Anocha Suwichakornpong, Thailand).