Some films land softly. Others bury themselves deep. Việt and Nam was the latter. After all the buzz in the film community, I finally got to watch it thanks to the filmmakers and producers who generously shared a screener after its festival run. What unfolded was something utterly arresting, gentle, quiet, and yet tectonically moving.

It tells the story of two coal miners, lovers, sharing fleeting intimacy before one seeks better opportunities abroad. As they prepare for their parting, they also search for the remains of a father, a fallen soldier. On paper, that sounds small. But in Trương Minh Quý’s hands, it’s everything. The film moves slowly, achingly so, but with such purpose that every breath, every look, every silence is saturated with meaning. I found myself still, unable to move even after the credits rolled. It demanded that kind of pause.

The cinematography is exquisite, the atmosphere dense with longing and dust. You fall in love with the characters not through grand gestures, but through watching them just be. The fact that it was banned in Vietnam for portraying a “gloomy, deadlocked, and negative view” of the country only made it more essential to me.

I remember sitting with Nicole Pham (the wonderful producer of Finding Phong) in Hanoi during my second research trip, she too was enamoured with this film, and equally frustrated at its restriction. We talked about how painful it is when a film of this calibre, this honesty, is not allowed to find its home audience.

And then came one of the most unexpected blessings of my trip: I got to meet Thanh Hải Phạm, who plays Việt. It was my final night in Hanoi. We sat in a small cafe, sipping iced coffee and cracking sunflower seeds, with his best friend by his side (also an actor in a recent indie). They walked in with massive smiles and were just… warm.

Thanh had never acted before Việt and Nam, his first role! Yet he delivered a performance so nuanced it broke my heart. In real life, he’s a game designer who leads a quiet life, and his humility was grounding. He spoke about the process of making the film and touring with it, with none of the ego or pretension that often comes with that world.

It reminded me how different film cultures are between East and West. That encounter stirred something in me, a desire to champion emerging talents like Thanh, to carve out spaces where films like Việt and Nam can breathe and be celebrated. Because cinema like this, intimate, bold, defiant, cannot stay underground forever.