It's always a treat when a movie is so completely outside your usual wheelhouse that even thinking you'd ever get a chance to see something like it is so totally out of the question that when it happens to come across the screen there's no choice but to watch - and Chi Tu Hau (aka Mrs. Tu Hau) (1962) is one of them. This North Vietnamese film, produced as US involvement was on the rise but not yet at full beans, tells the tale of a peasant midwife in the South who gradually gets more involved with the guerrilla insurgency after she is assaulted in a raid and the screws are put to her family and neighbors by corrupt local officials and their foreign overseers.
It's absolutely fascinating and a take on things that is unique in my viewing experience. The war is far more personal to the Vietnamese villagers and the realities of somebody's home being burned to the ground in a pointless attack is much more visceral (certainly by design) than is typical for a Hollywood portrayal, especially in the early '60s or into the '70s. Director Ky Nam Pham keeps things going at a rollicking pace but the standout is cinematographer Khanh Du Nguyen, who throws in some strikingly modernist, beautifully lit, and wonderfully composed images in what must have been less than ideal conditions. Actress Giang Tra as Tu Hau is superb as well. She gives a nuanced performance that is often painful to watch.
Yes, this is propaganda, but certainly no better or worse than what any side puts out when they are at war and it's not like you're watching some politburo blather about the latest five year plan either. This is a genuinely cinematic film from a time an a place that had the odds stacked against it achieving anything near the level they actually accomplished. Well worth seeing.
