GREENDRAGONMOVIE.COM First-wave Vietnamese in the '70s brought their customs to refugee camps in America.

Film traces 1st wave
of U.S. Vietnamese

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Star-Bulletin staff

VIETNAMESE WRITER Qui Duc Nguyen will speak tonight following the screening of Timothy Bui's "The Green Dragon."

Nguyen is author of "Where the Ashes Are, The Odyssey of a Vietnamese Family," (Addison-Wesley, 1994), co-editor of "Vietnam, A Traveler's Literary Companion" (Whereabouts Press, 1995), and "Once Upon A Dream, The Vietnamese-American Experience" (Andrews and McMell, 1995).

The film "The Green Dragon" tells about the first wave of Vietnamese refugees who came to America in 1975. Camps were set up across the southwestern deserts to house more than 100,000 Vietnamese immigrants before and immediately after the fall of Saigon.

A child, played by Trung Nguyen, searches daily for his mother at sprawling Camp Pendleton, Calif., encountering characters that embody ambition, hope, tragedy, false expectation and lost identity.

An American volunteer cook named Addie (Forest Whitaker) befriends the child, Minh. Without verbally understanding each other, they have an unusual bond through drawings, Batman comics and music, and the common loss of a mother.

"Green Dragon" Qui Duc Nguyen speaks following the 7 p.m. screening Not rated Playing at Wallace Art House at Restaurant Row

In another of the stories that merge, Minh's uncle Tai, played by Don Duong, is asked by Sgt. Jim Lance (Patrick Swayze) to be a camp manager. The war has ended, yet each has an internal battle in need of peace. Lance's brother died in the war and left behind a letter describing the only woman he ever loved, a Vietnamese nurse who cared for him when he was wounded.

Lance's journey of understanding, through both the letter and the woman, help assuage a guilt that has plagued him for years. Tai also is at war with his own guilt and, with Lance's help, finds the strength to look forward without forgetting the past.

Author Nguyen, a friend of director Bui, came to America in 1975 and in 1979 began setting up radio programs for the Vietnamese communities in California and Texas. He's also worked in international television in New York and with a multi-lingual Internet company in Los Angeles.

For several years, he was a regular commentator for National Public Radio's "All Things Considered," and was awarded A Citation for Excellence by the Overseas Press Club of America in 1989 for his NPR documentary on Vietnam. He has traveled extensively in Asia and Europe.

Nguyen currently hosts "Pacific Time," KQED public radio's national program focusing on Asia and its connections to the United States. The program is heard in Honolulu Friday evenings at 7:30 on KIPO 89.3 FM.

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