Bui Thac Chuyen: The director who "bombed" Cannes has cherished an 11-year dream of recreating Vietnamese history

Bui Thac Chuyen is a leading director of Vietnamese cinema, famous for his unique and profound filmmaking style. His works have left a deep impression on audiences and professionals, and have contributed to enriching Vietnamese cinema.

Director Bui Thac Chuyen, born October 11, 1968, is a Vietnamese filmmaker. Throughout his career, he is known to professionals and audiences for his works including 12A and 4H, Floating, Living in Fear, Bloo.d Curse and Glorious Ashes.

Although the number is not much, the works he created all won domestic and international film awards, in which he won four Best Director awards at the 2005 Kite Awards, the 2023 Kite Awards, the 16th Vietnam Film Festival and the 23rd Vietnam Film Festival.

Except for the commercial film, The Bloo.d Curse, most of his films are quite gritty and realistic. He is also the screenwriter and director of documentaries: Xam, which won the B prize of the Vietnam Cinema Association in 1998, and Tay dao dat, which won the Silver Kite award in 2003.

After completing high school, Bui Thac Chuyen continued to study Drama at the Hanoi Academy of Theatre and Cinema in 1985 and joined the Vietnam Drama Theater in 1990. During this time, he participated in prominent plays at the Vietnam Drama Theater such as "King Lia" (as Edgar), "Fable of the Year 2000" (as the old man)...

Since 1991, he began producing short films and television series. In 1993, a film classmate asked him to write a script and direct a short film for his graduation exam. The film 'Eternal Sorro.w' was released and won the Golden Swallow Award at the First National Student Film Festival.

Next were video films such as "Giọt mưa mat" which won the Silver Medal at the National Television Film Festival in 1994; or 12A and 4H which won the A prize from the Vietnam Cinema Association in 1995... After these successes, he joined Feature Film Studio I.

In 1997, Bui Thac Chuyen studied Directing at the Hanoi Academy of Theatre and Cinema. His graduation short film, "Night Ride" in 2000, won 3rd prize in the Cinéfondation category for young filmmakers at the Cannes Film Festival in 2000.

In 2001, Bui Thac Chuyen received funding from NHK to make the documentary Tay dao dat, about the life of farmer Ngo Duc Nhat, who worked hard to reclaim land full of remnants of war bombs and mines. Tay dao dat won the Silver Kite Award for Video Documentary at the 2002 Kite Awards.

In 2004, he continued to adapt Ngo Duc Nhat's story into a movie with the aim of expanding the content that the documentary could not exploit. The first title was Good Land, but then changed to Living in Fear to attract viewers. This was Bui Thac Chuyen's first movie and won many international and domestic awards.

In 2000, Bui Thac Chuyen read Phan Dang Di's draft of the script "Di Mai Roi Cung Ve" and felt interested in the subject. The two edited the script many times to create a film, with temporary titles "Tân cùng là Biển" and "Mắc Kết", which was finally changed to "Choi Voi".

With the sensitive topic of homosexuality, the script had to go through 3 revisions at Feature Film Studio I before being approved for funding in 2006. The film had a budget of about 7 billion VND, of which the State contributed 1.6 billion and international film funds supported 130 thousand Euros.

The film was released in 2009 and won many international awards. In 2010, Bui Thac Chuyen was chosen to direct the film Nguoi nguu huyet ngai based on positive feedback from the audience. This horror film earned 16 billion VND in the first week of release, although it had to be adapted from the horror genre to a mystery detective due to censorship. In 2011, the film project Ngu mo was funded with 150,000HKD and 10,000Euro from international funds, but due to lack of state funding, the project had to be suspended.

Since 2002, Bui Thac Chuyen has founded and directed the Center for Supporting and Developing Young Cinema Talents (TPD), which provides free film training courses for young people aged 15 to 20. The Center is affiliated with the Vietnam Cinema Association and sponsored by the Ford Cultural Foundation.

After the Ford Foundation withdrew its funding in 2013, he founded the Cinema Development Joint Stock Company (CDJ) under the auspices of the Vietnam Cinema Association. CDJ maintains TPD's activities by opening cinema classes. In 2017, he and directors Thanh Van and Hoang Phuong founded the Cinema Fund, supporting young artists in composing and producing films.

In 2021, after a decade of absence from the screen, Bui Thac Chuyen traveled around Ho Chi Minh City and Binh Duong for half a year to make a 5-episode documentary project called "Fearless" about the COVID-19 pandemic.

He took on all roles from director, scriptwriter, cinematographer to film editor. This documentary won the Silver Kite Award. In 2022, he released the feature film 'Glorious Ashes', after 7 years of preparation. The film won many awards and nominations at home and abroad. At the 2023 Kite Award, 'Glorious Ashes' won 4 important awards in the Feature Film category, including the Golden Kite Award for the film, along with awards for excellent director, excellent cinematographer and excellent supporting actress.

Recently, director Bui Thac Chuyen has just announced his brainchild that he has been nurturing for the past 11 years. For the first time, the war and the lives of guerrillas under the Cu Chi tunnels are recreated realistically and vividly on screen. The film is expected to be released in theaters from April 4, 2025. Director Bui Thac Chuyen has devoted 11 years of dedication to this project, starting from a 3D short film about the Cu Chi tunnels in 2014.

The work takes on the theme of war with a large-scale context but does not use the state budget. Businessman Nguyen Thanh Nam, one of the investors, shared: "We want to contribute to doing something meaningful to celebrate the 50th anniversary of peace and national reunification.

Bui Thac Chuyen's film is our choice. The main goal is to arouse young people's interest in the Vietnam War, while also giving international audiences, especially Americans, a different perspective than Hollywood. If the film is a commercial success, it will pave the way for other revolutionary war projects."

Inspired by real events after 1967, Bui Thac Chuyen's new film tells the story of the 21-man guerrilla team led by Bay Theo (Thai Hoa) at Binh An Dong base, Cu Chi. Bay Theo's team was tasked with protecting the area so that Hai Thung's (Hoang Minh Triet) strategic intelligence group could transmit secret documents by radio. When discovered by the US army, the guerrilla team had to face increasingly fierce raids...

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