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| Showtimes | Thu March 11 7:00 PM / KAB311A |
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USA, 1999, 113 mins, 35mm,
color, Vietnamese w/e.s.
Director/Screenplay Tony BUI; Producers Jason KLIOT, Joana VICENTE, Tony BUI; Exec. Prod. Harvey KEITEL; Story Tony BUI, Timothy Linh BUI; Cast Don DUONG, NGUYEN Ngoc Hiep, Harvey KEITEL, TRAN Manh Cuong, Zoë BUI, NGUYEN Huu Duoc
NAATA and the Asian Art Museum cordially invite you to attend the Opening
Night Gala of the 17th San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival
Thursday, March 11, 1999
7:00 pm Screening
AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres
1881 Post Street
San Francisco9:30 pm Golden Circle Gala Reception
with Director Tony BuiAsian Art Museum
Golden Gate Park
San Francisco
Acclaimed as one of the most accomplished feature debuts in contemporary American cinema, THREE SEASONS is a stunningly poetic tapestry of contemporary Vietnam, a groundbreaking work which introduces a unique Southeast Asian identity into the American independent scene. Created by 26-year-old Tony Bui, a Bay Area native and former NAATA grant recipient who first earned recognition with his short YELLOW LOTUS (SFIAAFF 1995), THREE SEASONS was heralded by the 1999 Sundance Film Festival as "achieving a pinnacle of excellence that is rare in filmmaking today."
The first American film shot in Vietnam since the war, THREE SEASONS captures the chaotic beauty and brutality of a country caught between tradition and modernity, intricately weaving together the stories of four characters who must relearn their way through a land that changes daily: A young woman’s mournful singing triggers both sorrow and inspiration for a poet secluded in a lotus-pond temple; a cyclo driver strives to earn enough money to please an ambitious prostitute; a tough street kid must find his stolen case of trinkets; and an American war veteran searches desperately for the daughter he has never seen.
Brought to life through the remarkable acting of the indomitable Harvey Keitel and a cast of Vietnamese professionals, cyclo drivers, street kids, and Vietnamese Americans, THREE SEASONS applies a melodramatic Southeast Asian elegance to enrich its metaphorical tales of hope, melancholy and chaos. Its sweeping, intensely visual beauty and uncommon sense of poetry point not only to the presence of a new Vietnam, but also to a possible future for American independent film, in which diverse cinematic traditions combine.
—Jason Sanders