| Poster Design by Janet Le |
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FROM THE FILMMAKER...This project began as a love poem — an intimately personal exploration of my own confused, angry, political, lonely, ashamed, desperate yearning to find others who were like me. It began as a very personal attempt to actively become both “Vietnamese” and “Queer” enough.
Shot on borrowed cameras during the weekends of my senior year of college, this film by no means represents the expansive narratives that make up the identity that is Queer Vietnamese Americans. Instead, I’m attempting to both validate through commonality as well as complicate the authority of a single narrative by providing contradictions and multiplicity as a possibility for alternate narratives to co-exist within the same body of work. I am so grateful to have had Ro, Nat, and Shannon share so much of their time and stories with me over these past few years to bring this project into completion. Before embarking on the journey of this project, I had almost no Vietnamese friends, no sense of Vietnamese community, and a fragile sense of Vietnamese identity, but the process of making this documentary with them has been instrumental in transforming the way I view my Vietnameseness today and it truly is my pleasure to finally have the opportunity to share this project I hold so near and dear to my heart with you! - Quyên NL, 2014 |
THE STORY...
The documentary follows the lives of three queer second generation Vietnamese Americans, navigating language, politics, and familial relationships - their stories add dimensions to Vietnamese diasporic experiences in community organizing, family, work in nail salons, and living in Little Saigon, Orange County, California:
Ro Nghiem is a second generation Vietnamese, post-punk, gay lesbian boy who is currently attending school for graphic design. They operate a blog about race and gender and distributes their self-published zine, "Not Straight Not White Not Male."
Natalie (Nat) Newton, Ph.D. is a Vietnamese American queer activist and strategic research analyst for social justice causes. Her leadership jettisoned Little Saigon OC into international view around politics that prevented LGBTs from marching in the largest gathering of diasporics in one place outside of Vietnam, the Westminster Tet Parade in 2013. Dr. Newton has published research and won national awards related to her work with Vietnamese lesbians in Saigon through her academic post at UC Irvine, which was also instrumental in the campaigns fight against the roundly false notion that "LGBT is against Vietnamese tradition." For more, please visit her website at www.natalienewtonteaching.wordpress.com
Shannon My Le is a claims adjuster for a workers’ compensation insurance company and is a part time entrepreneur. She is currently married to Katie Cheng; they reside in Little Saigon, Orange County, California. Prior to that she has lived San Diego and San Francisco. With Katie, she has been traveling around the world, playing League of Legends, and watching “The Walking Dead.”
Natalie (Nat) Newton, Ph.D. is a Vietnamese American queer activist and strategic research analyst for social justice causes. Her leadership jettisoned Little Saigon OC into international view around politics that prevented LGBTs from marching in the largest gathering of diasporics in one place outside of Vietnam, the Westminster Tet Parade in 2013. Dr. Newton has published research and won national awards related to her work with Vietnamese lesbians in Saigon through her academic post at UC Irvine, which was also instrumental in the campaigns fight against the roundly false notion that "LGBT is against Vietnamese tradition." For more, please visit her website at www.natalienewtonteaching.wordpress.com
Shannon My Le is a claims adjuster for a workers’ compensation insurance company and is a part time entrepreneur. She is currently married to Katie Cheng; they reside in Little Saigon, Orange County, California. Prior to that she has lived San Diego and San Francisco. With Katie, she has been traveling around the world, playing League of Legends, and watching “The Walking Dead.”
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shot & edited:
Quyên Nguyen-Le additional footage: Janet Le Jeffer Giang thuan nguyen vietnamese translations: Phước Thái Natalie Newton Vương Nguyễn Nguyễn Quốc Vinh transcriber: Keely Weiss |
SCREENINGS
2/12/2016 - Los Angeles, CA University of Southern California 4/19/2016 - Davis, CA University of California, Davis 5/28/2016 - Sacramento, CA Sacramento Asian Pacific Film Festival 6/5/2016, San Jose, CA San Jose State University 6/18/2016, Brea, CA Brea Congregational Church UCC 8/11/2016, Melbourne, Australia Hares Hyenas, Queering the Air Fundraiser 8/28/2016, Hanoi, Vietnam Queer Vietnamese Film Festival 12/2/2016, Montreal, Canada Studio XX, Atelier Céladon 2/1/2017, Irvine, CA University of California, Irvine 3/15/2017, Shepparton, AUSTRALIA 4/6/2017, Claremont, CA - 7pm Claremont Colleges 4/11/2017, Manhattan, KS - 5:30pm Kansas State University 4/13/2017, Los Angeles, CA - 6:15pm Cal State University, Los Angeles 4/19/2017, Boston, MA - 7pm Harvard University 5/19/2017, San Diego, CA UC San Diego 5/24/2017, Riverside, CA UC Riverside 4/3/2018, Stanford, CA Stanford University |
FROM PAST SCREENINGS!
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