Vietcong soldiers are romantic, poetic, jovial. You may not see this in Hollywood movies on the Vietnam War, but a new film, Song of the stork, gives you an alternative peek into a conflict that has been the subject of many movies in the last 25 years.

This Vietnamese-Singaporean co-production, which opened in Hanoi this week, gives a refreshing new, human perspective on the Vietnam War told through the real-life stories of Vietnamese who fought and survived to tell these them.

A 90-minute feature film, produced in Vietnamese with English subtitles, Song of the stork has already been shown in film festivals in Belgium and Canada.

"My interpretation of the Vietnam War was based on American movies and always the Vietnamese were dressed in pyjamas with straw hats running on the ground,'' Singaporean Jonathan Foo, who co-directed the film with Vietnam's Nguyen Phan Quang Binh, told IPS.

"So when I was doing a project for Singapore television (in Vietnam) I asked my Vietnamese friends, who were the Vietcong? They said, 'us, me and him'. I asked 'what?','' he recalled.

''Then I really learned that in the Vietnam War, all the people were involved," added Foo. "So we went and met a lot of families of friends and learned more about their stories. Then we decided to make a film about that, to tell their version of the war".

First joint-venture

This is how Foo's Singapore-based production company Mega Media and Binh's Hanoi-based Vietnam Media Corp joined hands to produce the first-ever Singapore-Vietnam joint-venture feature film.

Many of the blockbuster Hollywood movies on the Vietnam War such as Heaven and Earth, Apocalypse now and Full metal jacket have been filmed in nearby Thailand and the Philippines.

But the stories in Song of the stork were filmed at the very locations they originally occurred, along the Ho Chi Minh Trail from the north to the south of the country.

The film's characters are based on actual people and actual incidents from the war that killed five million Vietnamese. Almost every Vietnamese family has lost someone in the war and there are limitless stories of people's suffering, heroism and survival.

"All these stories you see on the film are true stories of our family and friends," said Binh, who was in Singapore recently to promote the film at an international media festival.

The film begins on April 30, 2000 when the 25th anniversary of the fall of Saigon was celebrated and former North Vietnamese war correspondent Tran Van Thuy journeys into his own mind and recalls the spirits of millions of Vietnamese who did not survive the war. Through his story and that of four other Vietnamese, the film goes back to the day of enlistment of the young men in 1968 to give us a glimpse into the life of the Vietcong soldier.

Four main characters

Unlike the bloodthirsty villains in the Hollywood movies, they are seen to be romantic, jovial, even poetic but at the same time fiercely loyal and dedicated to the task.

There are four main characters in the film, whose stories start with their enlistment into the army.

May is a happy-go-lucky jovial character, Manh is an underage soldier who lied about his age to be enlisted into the army. Van is a romantic who with his trusty guitar sings love songs and writes poetry while making his way through the Ho Chi Minh Trail, Lam is a spy who infiltrates the south and marries a daughter of a South Vietnamese colonel.

Vinh is the war correspondent who is always at the core of the action. His historical footage in black and white are used extensively in the film.

"This film is about finding out what our parents went through during the war," said Binh. "What happened during the war and how they feel."

There is very little war footage in the film, but a lot of jungle scenery as well as a touch of romance built into the story.

The message that tends to come through is that the Vietnamese people would have loved to lead normal lives, but constant aerial bombing by the enemy disturbed this peace. Yet, US soldiers or even their aircraft are hardly visible in the film.

"This is not really a war film, yes, it is about war, but it is about people," explained Foo.

"Most Hollywood movies have been from the point of view of the Americans or the South Vietnamese. This is from the North Vietnamese point of view and this is about their life during the war," he added.

Anti-war production

Binh argues that this film is an anti-war production. "War is not good, every time war happens both sides lose something. We don't want war to happen anywhere,'' he said.

While the production crew included both Singaporeans and Vietnamese, as well as a Malaysian cinematographer, the cast is almost entirely Vietnamese. The main characters are graduates of Vietnamese media training schools and universities.

There is a lot at stake in Song of the stork for the infant film industries of both countries, who are making a pitch to become centres of Asian filmmaking.

Binh says that working with directors from other countries allows one to learn a lot from each other, while Foo reckons that due to Singapore's small domestic market — of only four million people — it is important that Singaporean filmmakers go for co-productions like this one with other Asian countries, targeted at international audiences.

"I think co-production is the way to go for independent film producers, especially from Singapore, where we have limited landscape, fewer stories. But Asia itself has huge potential and I'll be looking in that direction," said Foo. — IPS