Activities
The year 2025 marks two decades of the establishment and development of the Varan documentary film workshop in Vietnam – a program that has nurtured the first generation of independent documentary filmmakers in our country. Notably, 2025 also marks 20 years since the workshop was first held in Ho Chi Minh City.
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This year’s program includes several works by members and alumni of Varan Vietnam - films that carry a spirit of observing life, closeness to their subjects, and a deeply personal approach to documentary cinema.
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The short film “The Dream is a Snail” by young director Nguyễn Thiên Ân is currently the only Vietnamese film selected among the Top 10 short films competing at the Cannes Film Festival 2026 (Short Film Competition).
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Nguyễn Thiên Ân began his filmmaking journey entirely self-taught, through short fiction films filled with color and imagination. He gradually found his way to real-life stories and the direct cinema approach through documentary work. This transformation did not close off his earlier path but opened a new creative direction: an intriguing interplay between reality and fiction, between observation and construction.
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A new collaboration between Varan Vietnam, Still_thinking_space, and p.artspace has officially launched with a screening titled Looking Back – Reincarnation, opening a series of film presentations featuring works by directors from the Varan Vietnam community.
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What the three films share is not theme or geography, but approach: patient, close, and unimposing. The people on screen are neither staged nor embellished. They are simply seen, and sometimes, being seen is enough. CinEscape remains a space where films like these can find the audience they deserve.
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Varan Vietnam Films
Director: Tran Phuong Thao & Swann Dubus
Year: 2014
Time: 90 minutes
Phong grew up in a small town in Central Vietnam as the youngest of six siblings. From an early age, Phong felt like a girl trapped in a boy’s body. It was only after moving to Hanoi to attend university at age 20 that Phong realized she was not alone in this experience. Her dream of “finding herself” through gender transition came true a few years later. The film tells the story of Phong’s struggle during these years, featuring excerpts from her private video diaries, as well as meetings with family, friends, and doctors – all of whom must come to accept her determination to become a complete young woman.
Phong grew up in a small town in Central Vietnam as the youngest of six siblings. From an early age, Phong felt like a girl trapped in a boy’s body. It was only after moving to Hanoi to attend university at age 20 that Phong realized she was not alone in this experience. Her dream of “finding herself” through gender transition came true a few years later. The film tells the story of Phong’s struggle during these years, featuring excerpts from her private video diaries, as well as meetings with family, friends, and doctors – all of whom must come to accept her determination to become a complete young woman.
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Children of the Mist follows Di, a 12-year-old H’Mông girl, on her journey of growing up amid the clash between traditional and modern cultures. The film portrays the innocent childhood of the girl, her childhood games related to the custom of “bride kidnapping,” and then her harsh confrontation when she becomes a victim of this tradition, leading to a broken childhood and the challenges of maturation. This documentary, directed by Hà Lệ Diễm, has been acclaimed for its authentic, respectful portrayal of H’Mông culture and the complex realities faced by indigenous communities in Sa Pa. It was recognized among the top documentary films shortlisted for the Oscars.
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The day-to-day battles of patients who reinvent their lives in a small alley near their hospital in Hanoi, far from their villages and families.
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Inside a care center in Ba Vi, Hanoi, patients dream of a normal life, yearning for the warmth of affection, sending messages beyond the iron bars, hoping to be heard.
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“Grave diggers for hire” is a quiet documentary following Bình and Ngọc, two men who make a living by exhuming graves at a rural cemetery near Hanoi. Behind this daily work are profound reflections on health, death, and the meaning of preserving a tradition that is gradually fading away. This documentary sensitively explores the lives of those maintaining the cultural practice of grave exhumation, shedding light on deeper human and social themes.
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The film serves as a bridge bringing the filmmaker closer to the lively, full-of-surprises life of a 35-year-old “comrade police officer,” a world filled with dreams and desires for love. Yet behind that, there are vague traces of reality intertwined with distant fantasies.
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Mr. Phương lives isolated from the outside world by cardboard boxes. There, he eats, sleeps, reads books, writes poetry, keeps a diary, designs circuit boards, and repairs electronic devices.The greatest inconvenience is the lack of electricity, which prevents him from soldering his beloved circuit boards and fulfilling the mission he has set for himself.
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In a school where visually impaired students learn with sighted peers, twin brothers Phát and Nhân pursue their musical dreams in a secret studio they built in their dormitory.
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