Vietnam: A Television History; Interview with Thu Van, 1981

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Transcript

Filming the Vietnam War

SR 2046.

Thu Van.

Beep tone.

Roll 46 of Vietnam Project.

265 Take 1.

Clap stick.

Interview with Thu Van.

Interviewer:

Could you tell me why you went north in 1954?

Thu Van:

When the Geneva was signed there was a number of cadres and soldiers...

366, Take 1.

Clap stick.

Interviewer:

Could you tell me why did you go north?

Thu Van:

After the Geneva Agreements, I was sent north to study film-making.

Interviewer:

You filmed for a long period during the war. Could you tell me what was

the most memorable or distressing scene that you saw?

Thu Van:

During my film-making career in the North during the war years, the

most memorable things were the crimes committed by the United States on

the Vietnamese civilians. I filmed many scenes of women and children

hit by American bombs. There was this very painful scene of a mother

and her four children killed at the same time. These are scenes that I

will never forget.

Another unforgettable thing is the full cooperation and support the

inhabitants of the North gave us during the war years when we went

around filming the ways they resiliently fought back at the Americans

and the indescribable crimes poured down on their heads. The spirit of

the people was remarkable.

Interviewer:

You were away for a long time from your family. When you went away did

you envision that it would be anything as long a period of time and did

you have any contact with your family when you went away?

Thu Van:

When I went away, the (Geneva) Agreements stated that there should be

mail exchanges between the two regions, the region under the control of

the Vietnamese government and the area under temporary control of the

French. But the French never allowed this to happen. Therefore, there

was no contact with my family at all in term of sending letters and

postcards.

Interviewer:

Could you tell us how you got assigned to filming the final Offensive?

What the sights which you saw? What was happening to you? And what

difficulties did you have in catching up with the scenes and so on.

Thu Van:

I was the only female film-maker who specialized on documentary and war

films. Therefore, when I proposed to accompany the Offensive I was

given permission to go. And my film crew and I were going to head for

Ban Me Thuot because there was a victory there, a victory which had

been talked about a lot in the American press and on the Western radio.

But as soon as we reached Vinh Linh (immediately north of the 17th

parallel),Hue was liberated.

Therefore, with this fast-unfolding situation, it was impossible for us

to go to Ban Me Thuot. Hence, we went toHue and then Da Nang. When I

arrived in Hue, it had already been totally liberated. The Americans

and the puppet troops had fled. As for Da Nang, I arrived there on the

31st, the day after liberation. The Americans and the Saigon troops,

again, had fled.

Of course, as my film crew accompanied a contingent of troops which

headed for the city from the northern direction there was some

resistance from the puppet troops. Along the road I saw many corpses of

the Saigon troops, and their weapons and clothes which they had stopped

off were strewn all over the place. When we entered the city of Da Nang

the first thing that happened was our meeting with a group of disbanded

Saigon soldiers who had been hiding in a graveyard and who stood up to

surrender to us.

This was the first scene which I filmed for the movie "The Liberation

of Da Nang". This was a group of Saigon soldiers without any uniforms

on them. After that we went into the heart of the city, filming all the

scenes which show how the Saigon troops fled and left behind pikes of

clothes all along the streets and the beach of Da Nang.

They also left behind heaps of weapons, many tanks and jeeps and scores

of GMC trucks which had been driven down into the sea when the Saigon

soldiers tried to board the American boats. At that time we had a lot

of work to do, so we divided our crew into two groups. One group filmed

the scenes around the city itself. And the other group filmed the

American military bases. At that time we were very moved by the fact

that Da Nang had been the longest occupied city under the Americans.

And as film-makers at that moment when there was a great victory for

the nation, we decided to work as hard as possible to get as many good

scenes as possible. We managed to film the last encounters with the

fleeing Saigon troops and the traces of defeat as well as of crimes

which the Americans still left behind in the city. After that it took

us only fifteen days to edit the film "The Liberation of Da Nang" and

show it to the public. After Da Nang we headed for Qui Nhon and then

Saigon.

Reunification with family in Da Nang

367, Take 1.

Clap stick.

Interviewer:

Can you tell me again about your return to Da Nang?

Thu Van:

My native city is Da Nang. After the Geneva Agreements were signed, I

went to the North to study. During the period in the North, I never had

any contact with my family in Da Nang. I never received any letters

from them at all. In 1975, during the Spring Offensive, I went back to

Da Nang.

When I arrived in Da Nang I really wanted to go and visit my family.

But during the twenty years from 1955 to 1975, between the changes from

the French period to the American period, the city was nor completely

unrecognizable to me. The city was now completely different from the

one I left, and so I could not locate my family at all.

I stopped a man riding a Honda motorcycle and asked him of the street.

He told me where it was now and said that he knew of my sister's family

which still resided on that street. After I finished with my work, I

was able to go home to see my family. When I found my family, I met my

mother again after twenty years of absence. Before we could say a

single word, we embraced each other and wept. After that my mother

inquired after my health and my work.

During the conversations with my family, I learned that all my nephews

had become Saigon soldiers. My nephews' friends were all puppet troops.

In the film "The Liberation of Da Nang" there is a boy who lost one of

his arms. This boy refused to go into the Thieu's army and destroyed

one of his arms with a grenade as a form of protest. But all my own

nephews had to go into the Saigon army.

They, however, managed to pay up to a million dongs each so that they

did not have to go and fight in the battlefields. My father had been

killed by the Americans because he chose to remain behind in the city

to continue with clandestine activities. And my mother who also

participated in the many movements against the Americans and the Saigon

regime had been thrown into jail many times. She had been arrested,

tortured, and jailed for many years by the Americans.

After I arrived back in the city, I was very happy to be able to see my

family again. At the same time, I was also somewhat sad because my

family had suffered various physical and moral losses. But the most

happy thing for me was to be able to see my mother after twenty years

and that my brothers and nephew and nieces were all alive and were all

remaining in the city.

368, Take 1.

Clap stick.

Interviewer:

Could you tell me a little bit more about the actual shock, especially

at the discovery of the death of your father. What were your feelings

then?

Thu Van:

When my mother told me about the things that had happened to the family

there, I was thinking that during the war years my family had to live

under the control of the Nguyen Van Thieu regime and therefore, first

of all, there was no relationship between my family and me and,

secondly, the family had to try very hard to make a living and at the

same time had to find ways to resist the power that forced them to do

the things that they did not want to do.

I was particularly struck by the fact that my mother, in spite of her

age, had to fight in order to survive under the repressive Thieu regime

and had been imprisoned as a result. Therefore, it was already a happy

moment for me to be able to locate my family when I arrived in Da Nang.

What made me really happy was the thought that now my mother would be

able to lead a more peaceful life. Of course my family was not as well

off as other families, but there was no more insecurity and no more

fear of sudden imprisonment.

Transcript

Transcript

Series: Vietnam: A Television History

Raw Footage: Interview with Thu Van, 1981

Contributing Organization: WGBH (Boston, Massachusetts)

AAPB ID: cpb-aacip/15-pc2t43j76x

If you have more information about this item than what is given here, or if you have concerns about this record, we want to know! Contact us, indicating the AAPB ID (cpb-aacip/15-pc2t43j76x).

Description

Credits: Publisher: WGBH Educational Foundation
Writer: Thu, Van

AAPB Contributor Holdings: WGBH
Identifier: cfd674565760c97e0a944ce318c2cd30abffee91 (ArtesiaDAM UOI_ID)
Format: video/quicktime
Color: Color
Duration: 00:16:11:08

Citations: Chicago: “Vietnam: A Television History; Interview with Thu Van, 1981,” 1981-02-18, WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed November 13, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-pc2t43j76x.; MLA: “Vietnam: A Television History; Interview with Thu Van, 1981.” 1981-02-18. WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. November 13, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-pc2t43j76x>.; APA: Vietnam: A Television History; Interview with Thu Van, 1981. Boston, MA: WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-pc2t43j76x