Qui Nguyen’s Vietgone is a contemporary and modern twist on the classic boy meets girl story. Based on the real life experiences of his parents, Nguyen intertwines his comedic style with the tragic reality that refugees of war must face, and creates a story that allows the tragedy of the survivors of the Vietnam War to become accessible to a modern American audience. Director Jamie Castaneda and the American Conservatory Theatre bring this production to life in San Francisco, where a blend of technology, hip-hop, and an all-Asian cast crew brings justice to a story often untold. The play mainly follows two refugees who manage to find love despite their circumstances. However, beyond the tale of two unlikely lovers is a story about dealing with loss, finding one’s identity, and navigating one’s way through a …show more content…
Of crucial importance is the different attitudes between Nguyen and Quang has towards the Vietnam War. Nguyen represents the traditional view that the Vietnam War was a failure on the part of the Americans, a mistake and pointless war that ruined the lives of many. What is surprising is Quang’s view. With an immediate and loud retort to Nguyen’s negative feelings towards the Vietnam war, Seol’s portrayal of Quang immediately grabs the audience’s attention. Quang is grateful for the Vietnam war, and “thankful for the American soldiers that gave up their lives so [he] could live.” Actor Seol aptly captures the spirit and sentiments of an actual Vietnamese refugee, and in doing so provides a refreshing and different perspective about the Vietnam War. Faced with these differing perspectives, the audience must come to realize that America is not a monolith, but instead composed of people from many different backgrounds with varying experiences, attitudes, thoughts, and
The growing perceived ineffectiveness and illegitimacy of America’s role in Vietnam was the product of what was viewed as little more than an anti-communist crusade in which neither logistical concerns nor the nationalist motivations of a people who had yearned for sovereignty over centuries carried significant weight. Less and less Americans were willing to bankroll, much less have their sons paying “any price” or bearing “any burden” for what was becoming a quagmire. Bodybag after bodybag was being filled with American boys on a daily basis, not to mention that every dollar of damage incurred by the Communist enemy in Hanoi cost the United States ten dollars , helping to quickly bring an end to an era of unprecedented American prosperity.
Vietnam was an entirely new type of war for the United States. It still remains morally and historically problematic in today’s society. The Vietnam War had a tremendous impact on American society and culture, primarily because it was the first war to be televised. The American press played a significant
The war in Vietnam was a war against communism that tore apart the US. The United States of America plunged together with its allies and played a tremendous role as far as fight against communism is concerned. A huge number of American soldiers were deployed in Vietnam a practice that coupled with much unpreparedness. The soldiers were not aware what exactly they were up to in Vietnam. Most Americans at the time were very much against the act. It was one of the most deliberating wars America plunged herself into and the only one to have been lost. Most intriguing is the amount of publicity and media buzz created by the film industry. Vietnam War was the topic of many television networks, music and Hollywood. Journalist and veterans and scholar were never left behind and went ahead to produce tones of literature on the legacies and lessons to be learnt from the war (Hochgesang, Lawyer, and Stevenson). The exploitation of the soldiers and rejection of the veterans created just as much interest as the war had created. One such commentary came from George Kennan, who depicted the war as one of the most disastrous mission The United States has ever undertaken (Westheider 155-159).. This essay will establish the effects the war had to the US soldiers.
The Viet Nam War has been the most reviled conflict in United States history for many reasons, but it has produced some great literature. For some reason the emotion and depredation of war kindle in some people the ability to express themselves in a way that they may not have been able to do otherwise. Movies of the time period are great, but they are not able to elicit, seeing the extremely limited time crunch, the same images and charge that a well-written book can. In writing of this war, Tim O'Brien put himself and his memories in the forefront of the experiences his characters go through, and his writing is better for it. He produced a great work of art not only because he experienced the war first hand, but because he is able to convey the lives around him in such vivid detail. He writes a group of fictional works that have a great deal of truth mixed in with them. This style of writing and certain aspects of the book are the topics of this reflective paper.
Bao Ninh’s The Sorrow of War is a novel that is a personal view of the Vietnam War from the perspective of a Vietnamese soldier. Like the American novel “The things they carried”, this novel brings about the effects of war on people, and especially how it defeats the human capacity for things such as love and hope. Bao Ninh offers this realistic picture of the Vietnam War’s impact on the individual Vietnamese soldier through use of a series of reminiscences or flashbacks, jumping backwards and forwards in time between the events most salient in memory, events which take on a different theme each time they are examined. His main protagonist Kien, who is basically Bao himself, looks back not just at his ten years at
The Vietnam war was an absolutely brutal time in American history. The war lasted for the majority of the 1960s and left many young men dead. The short story “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien and the film Dear America: Letters Home from Vietnam give us just a glance into the war by giving using the three themes of fear, pressures, and blame/guilt to embody the concept of war and how it absolutely changes a person. War not only destroys countries, but it destroys people.
To this day the Vietnam War is still considered to be one of the most devastating wars in history and has been a topic of resentment to the American culture thirty-three years after its end. For the American public it’s marked as being the point in history where distrust in our government was at an all-time high, mainly because most of the war’s carnage was witnessed on television for the first time. For all the bloodshed American and Vietnamese soldiers suffered through, the war has left a perpetual mark not only on the United States but ultimately has left a permanent scar on the soldiers who fought and managed to survive the war. Renowned war poet, Bruce Weigl, like most young American men during the time was only nineteen when he
Bao Ninh's The Sorrow of War is a contrapuntal reading to American literature on the Vietnam War. But rather than stand in stark contrast to Tim O' Brien's The Things They Carried, The Sorrow of War is strangely similar, yet different at the same time. From a post-colonialist standpoint, one must take in account both works to get an accurate image of the war. The Sorrow of War is an excellent counterpoint because it is truthful. Tim O' Brien writes: ". . . you can tell a true war story by its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil." (O' Brien, 42) Bao Ninh succeeds in this respect. And it was for this reason that the Vietnamese
Since 1968, there have been at least 25 films made that portray the events of the Vietnam War. Historians have to ask themselves when watching these films, "Did the fictional character represent historical figures accurately? Is this how a soldier would react in this situation?" The point of view of the director of the film can change with simple alterations in camera angles. For example, a view from the ground of a battle seen can show how the innocent people had the war in their own backyards. The view from a helicopter can show Viet Cong firing rounds at American troops and the troops can't tell the difference between the innocent and the enemy. The audience feels empathy and sympathy for the person from whose point of view the
The stunning film, Good Morning, Vietnam, starring Robin Williams does an incredible job encompassing the atmosphere Vietnam War. It begins in 1965 when radio disc jockey Adrian Cronauer is sent to Vietnam to broadcast events on the Armed Forces Radio Service. It takes place in Saigon and includes compelling shots of the geographical features of Vietnam; jungles, cities and beaches. Cronauer begins every report with the notorious "Gooood morning, Vietnam!" and continues will jokes and upbeat music to make troops all over the country smile. He infuriates his superiors by playing unapproved music and reporting unofficial news. He befriends a local boy, Tuan, in the English class he teaches to an eager group of Vietnamese citizens. Throughout the film viewers fall in love with Tuan and feel utmost empathy for him until it is revealed that he is a Viet Cong. In the climax of the story Cronauer confronts Tuan and yells "I gave you my friendship. My trust. And now they tell me that my best friend is the goddamn enemy!" to which Tuan responds with "Enemy?! What is enemy?! You killing my people miles away from your home. We not the enemy. You the enemy." This encompasses the controversy over Americas involvement in Vietnam and goes straight to the viewers heart.
The Vietnam War divided the country and led to several americans searching for not only their identity and morals, but the morals of the nation as a whole. Many people questioned what good the fighting was for and saw more and more news coverage about the horrible failures of the War leading to a mistrust in the U.S. government. In Bobbie Ann Mason’s book, In Country: The Story of an American Family, Bobbie Ann Mason tells a coming of age story about Samantha Hughes who searches for understanding and meaning in a War that has affected her family and country greatly. Using dialogue and plot construction, Mason successfully examines the changes in morality towards violence and war.
A quarter of a century after the Fall of Saigon, Vietnam continues to exercise a powerful hold of the American psyche. No deployment of American troops abroad is considered without the infusion of the Vietnam question. No formulation of strategic policy can be completed without weighing the possibility of Vietnanization. Even the politics of a person cannot be discussed without taking into account his opinion on the Vietnam Ware. This national obsession with Vietnam is perfectly national when viewed from a far. It was the only war that the United States has ever lost. It defined an era of American history that must rank with the depression as one of this nation’s most traumatic. It concluded with Watergate and led many to believe that the
Ninh’s novel jumps between flashbacks of the war and Kien’s love affairs, in particular one with his childhood sweetheart Phuong. Ninh uses the reoccurring theme of Kien’s love, or loss of love, as a metaphor for the impact the war had on the Vietnamese people. The original title of the novel is actually The Destiny of Love. Kien likens the war to a soldiers love saying, “The sorrow of war inside a soldier’s heart was in a strange way similar to the sorrow of love. It was a kind of nostalgia…It was a sadness, a missing, a pain which could send one soaring back into the past” (Ninh, 94). Kien does find himself often reminiscing of his young innocent love with Phuong. The end of the novel focuses
The Vietnam film is a specific sub-genre of the conventional Hollywood war film that arose as a result of the 1960s counter culture. According to Elliot Stegall’s article Ideological, Dystopic, and Antimythopoetic Formations of Masculinity in the Vietnam War Film many American war films depicted the glorification of war and emphasized the concept of American masculinity (Stegall). Previous to the Vietnam period, Hollywood war films stuck to contemporary tropes. These films often re-enact the idea of good versus evil in which the male hero of the film triumphantly fights for their country against a vilified enemy; thus reinforcing the American ideology of conquering the frontier (Schweitzer 67). The hollywood war films are often enjoyable
The subject of my interview is a 68 year elderly Vietnamese man named Minh “Bi” Ngo. Mr. Ngo has white long hair, a medium long white beard and a distinctive mole on the bottom of his left eye and a thick Vietnamese accent. He was born and raised in Vietnam on April 3rd, 1947. He is also a widow who is currently living with his daughter in Westminster, Orange County. Originally, Mr. Ngo was from the city of Buon Ma Thuot in the province of Dak Lak, Vietnam. He then immigrated to Falls Church, Virginia where he began his new life in the United States. At the time of the interview, Mr. Ngo looked very exhausted yet grateful at the same time. I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Ngo through his daughter, who is a friend of my cousin. I conducted the interview on the afternoon of September 24th, which lasted for two hours. During the interview Mr. Ngo shared with me his experiences during the Vietnam war, his times in the Vietnamese Reeducation camps, his immigration to the United States, and his involvement in the Vietnamese community today. As the interview continues on, I began to comprehend a little bit more on the way it was back then and how the common folks