DMP 121 Movie Review of "Journey from the Fall" by Ham Tran

In DMP 121: Media Scriptwriting and Storyboarding, Dewey suggested we watch the film, "Journey from the Fall" written by Ham Tran. It is the story of Vietnamese boat people that fled communist China. It is brilliant, but the back story - or at least Ham Tran's telling of it - is incredible, too. In itself, it is a story.

Tran wanted to create a movie that would remain true to the struggles the Vietnamese people faced as they decided to either stay and suffer re-education camps or leave and risk death by starvation, dehydration, or pirate violence.

The stories he tells in his interview with the Asian Pacific Arts are excellent; he continuously revised the story to match the real details of the experience. He listened to the people who actually survived the experience, and revised the script daily.

Here are the two YouTube interviews with him:



and



I want to thank Dewey for suggesting the movie, but I want to thank Ham Tran, too, for telling a story that none of us ever get to hear.

The students were able to learn that some of the best script writing is done when we listen to the truth; when we pause and listen to the voices of those who truly know and not the ones who simply claim to know, we can create authentic representations of history.