The movie was directed by Truong Minh Quy who will compete in the Un Certain Regard category, given to international films that tell stories in non-traditional ways.
The movie follows coal miners Nam and Viet who work 300 metres below ground where danger awaits and darkness prevails. Nam seeks to escape his future in coal mining and hires a smuggler to transport him to the Western world. Before leaving, Nam journeys with Viet and his mother, who claims to hear Nam’s father—a Vietnamese soldier—in her dreams, calling out for his missing body.
Truong Minh Quy, 34, was born in Buon Ma Thuot city in the Central Highlands of Vietnam.
He is an alumnus of the 2012 Asian Film Academy (Busan International Film Festival) and 2016 Berlinale Talents. His films have been selected for several international film festivals and exhibitions including the Locarno International Film Festival, the New York Film Festival, the Clermont-Ferrand Film Festival, the International Short Film Festival Oberhausen, IFFR, the Busan International Film Festival, and Les Rencontres Internationales Paris/Berlin.
He received the main Art Prize at the 20th VideoBrasil held back in 2017 in São Paulo. His second feature, The Tree House, premiered in 2019 at the Locarno Film Festival where it was acclaimed as “one of the festival’s three best premieres” by MUBI and “a singular entrancing ode to memory and filmmaking” by The Film Stage. The film was then screened at major festivals worldwide.
