Actifilms Saigon

Palestine, Mai 07

saigontoine — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 15:07:00 +0700

Palestine, Gaza, Nusseirat camp, Mai 25th 2007

Mahmud Hams - AFP (c), Bayeux-Calvados Prize for the best War photographer 07.

Che 1967-2007

saigontoine — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 16:34:00 +0700

1967-2007, 49th birthday of Guevara's murder

__Revolutionary icon: World marks 40th anniversary of Che Guevara’s death By Alvaro Zuazo, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Friday, October 5, 2007__

SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia - Fidel Castro insists Ernesto (Che) Guevara could never have been taken prisoner 40 years ago if his gun hadn’t malfunctioned. But the retired Bolivian general who led the mission to capture him says the Argentine revolutionary was hardly a heroic figure in his final moments.

The man that Gen. Gary Prado remembers - sad, sick, hungry, dressed in rags and alone in the jungle - simply dropped his gun and surrendered, saying, "Don’t shoot, I’m Che."

"He wasn’t the figure of the heroic guerrilla," Prado recalled in an interview with The Associated Press Thursday night.

Decades after he gave up a comfortable middle class life in Argentina to foment armed rebellion, Guevara still inspires and infuriates people around the world.

He is an icon for fans who have made his death scene a tourist trap. His face is instantly recognizable, a one-dimensional image on posters and T-shirts that either celebrate or mock his revolutionary ideals.

Prado is bitter that Guevara still gets so much global attention four decades later. He’s angry that Bolivia’s leftist President Evo Morales plans to honour Guevara but not the 55 soldiers who died putting down his attempted revolution in Bolivia.

Che "wasn’t someone to inspire terror or anything, but simply to be pitied," he said.

Castro has put a noble spin on the death of his fellow revolutionary and close friend, calling Guevara "not a man who could have been taken prisoner" with a working gun.

"Wounded and without a weapon they were able to hold him and take him to a small town nearby, La Higuera," Castro told Spanish writer Ignacio Ramonet for the book "100 Hours with Fidel."

"The following day, October 9, 1967, at noon, they executed him in cold blood," Castro said.

Prado said the order to kill Guevara, then 39, came not from the CIA operatives who joined his soldiers, but from Bolivia’s president, who wanted to avoid a trial that would give Guevara a global platform to spread his views. Prado said he wasn’t present when Guevara was shot.

"Why did they think that by killing him, he would cease to exist as a fighter?" Castro asked in 1997, when Guevara’s remains were finally laid to rest in Cuba amid thundering cannons. "Today he is in every place, wherever there is a just cause to defend."

Those who knew him personally remember a complex character: sardonic and demanding of himself as well as others.

"He always did what he said he was going to do," said Alberto Granados, who travelled with Che across South America on a broken-down motorcycle in 1952, a trip portrayed in the hit 2004 movie "The Motorcycle Diaries."

"That’s why he is still timely," added Granados, who is now in his 80s and lives in Havana.

Guevara’s Cuban enemies, now living in exile, remember a man who did not flinch after Castro and his rebels came to power. It was Guevara who oversaw the military tribunals and subsequent firing squad executions of hundreds of people: military, police and other officials of the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista.

Cuba will honour him Monday with a ceremony at the tomb where his remains are kept, beneath a gigantic bronze statue built in his image in Santa Clara, where Guevara oversaw a decisive victory for the Cuban rebels. Cuba also planned a gathering of 1,500 people playing chess, Guevara’s favourite game.

In Bolivia, Che fans were gathering in the jungle where he was captured and in La Higuera, where he was killed. A new Che statue is being built in his native Argentina, Venezuela is holding an art and music festival in his honour, and students were painting huge Che portraits in Mexico City’s subway.

Guevara’s image is ubiquitous in Cuba, where a giant stylized rendering of his face oversees Havana’s Plaza of the Revolution. Cuban schoolchildren start their daily classes by pledging: "Pioneers for communism. We will be like Che!"

Those who knew him personally would consider that difficult. They recall him being a taskmaster insistent on austerity.

"He was demanding of everyone and practised being a personal example," wrote Tirso Saenz, an adviser when Guevara served as Cuba’s Industry Minister. Once, Guevara and other ministry officials were served fat, juicy steaks during a severe food shortage. Steaks are a treasured meal for Argentines, but Guevara became incensed and ordered it all removed.

"What is this?" Saenz quoted Guevara as saying in his biography. "No one is touching this meat. Take it away."

Leftists still cherish the image of the dogmatic Marxist wearing a beret, a determined gaze and an unkempt beard. But anti-communists hate what he stood for.

One such man is Cuban exile and former CIA operative Gustavo Villoldo, now living in Florida, who hopes to profit from a lock of hair snipped from the slain rebel’s head in Bolivia. Now 71, Villoldo said he kept the hair and other items in a scrapbook since participating in that mission. Heritage Auction Galleries of Dallas is auctioning them off on Oct. 25-26.

The auction has generated much discussion among Cuban exiles. Some fear a Che fan will buy them and put them on reverent display.

Prado said that after Guevara surrendered in the jungle to his squad of 70 Bolivian soldiers, he asked what they planned to do with him, and that they initially told him he would be put on trial.

"I’m worth more to you alive than dead," Prado remembers him responding.

Guevara was shot the next day. He would have been 79 this year.

Associated Press Writer Anita Snow in Havana contributed to this report.

More bodies recovered from Vietnam bridge collapse

saigontoine — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 15:12:00 +0700

As it was not enough for the vietnamese workers, this drama happend in Cantho destroying life of many families..

REUTERS - Thu Sep 27, 2007 9:48am EDT

More bodies recovered from Vietnam bridge collapse

By Ho Binh Minh

CAN THO, Vietnam (Reuters) - Recovery crews found eight more bodies in the rubble of a Vietnamese bridge on Thursday, taking the death toll from the collapse to around 60, officials said.

As many as 180 were injured, some of them suffering critical head wounds, in Wednesday morning's collapse of a section of a Japanese-funded bridge under construction in the southern Mekong Delta. Some 250 workers were on site at the time.

Military doctor Colonel Mai Ninh Nhat said two workers had also died of their injuries on Thursday.

Relatives crowded the military hospital in Can Tho city, which was visited by yellow-garbed Buddhist monks offering sympathies and cash to the victims' families.

President Nguyen Minh Triet visited Can Tho general hospital and the scene of the collapse near the busy Hau River that separates Can Tho from Vinh Long province. The site is 170 km (105 miles) southwest of Ho Chi Minh City.

"I visited many families. I share their pain. These pains are extreme," Triet told reporters.

"This is a regrettable accident but we wish that contractors, regulators will draw a lesson to overcome its consequences and ensure absolute safety."

Underdeveloped Vietnam is ramping up infrastructure projects to keep pace with an economy growing at more than 8 percent a year.

There were conflicting reports about the death toll with one contractor reporting 60 killed and the official Vietnam News Agency said 64 died and 180 were injured.

Officials said eight bodies were found on Thursday, the newspaper Saigon Giai Phong (Liberation Saigon) reported.

Nguyen Thi Chien said her son-in-law Nguyen Van Chien, injured in the collapse, had gone to work on the bridge because he could earn more money there than from river fishing, his family's traditional business.

"He does not know anything from yesterday," she said of her son-in-law as she sat in the yard of the military hospital in Can Tho. The hospital is treating the most serious cases and many of them were unconscious.

MOST SERIOUS ACCIDENT

Transport Minister Ho Nghia Dung said in an interview with Reuters TV that the collapse was "the most serious ever bridge incident in the history of the transport sector".

Dung was one of several cabinet ministers in the ruling Communist Party to visit the scene of the disaster.

He said construction would resume as soon as the site was cleared and safe.

The twisted mass of steel, broken concrete and bent scaffolding stood at the height of a five-storey building about 500 meters (550 yards) from the river in Vinh Long.

The reason for the accident was not immediately known, but officials said rains may have softened the foundations, causing scaffolding to collapse and bringing down a 90-metre (300-foot) section that was being worked on.

One preliminary estimate of the cost put it at $2.5 million.

A spokesman for one of the Japanese companies in a joint venture to build the 2.75-km (1.7-mile) long bridge said 16 of its workers were all accounted for.

Work on the bridge started in 2004 to link Can Tho and Vinh Long province and it was scheduled for completion next year.

Where’s Vietnam (4)

saigontoine — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:59:00 +0700

'Viet' by Harvey Bialy

An Anti-War slam by Harvey Bialy.

Myanmar forces open fire on protesters

saigontoine — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 10:09:00 +0700

YANGON, Myanmar - Myanmar security forces opened fire on Buddhist monks and other pro-democracy demonstrators Wednesday for the first time in a month of anti-government protests, killing at least one man and wounding others in chaotic confrontations across Yangon.
Finally, after 3 weeks of black out all around Asia, the media start to inform their public about the dramatic situation in Burma and the pacific protest of the monks against the military regim..

Dramatic images of the protests, many transmitted from the secretive Southeast Asian nation by dissidents using cell phones and the Internet, riveted world attention on the escalating faceoff between the military regime and its opponents.

Clouds of tear gas and smoke from fires hung over streets, and defiant protesters and even bystanders pelted police with bottles and rocks in some places. Onlookers helped monks escape arrest by bundling them into taxis and other vehicles and shouting "Go, go, go, run!"

The government said one man was killed when police opened fire during the ninth consecutive day of demonstrations, but dissidents outside Myanmar reported receiving news of up to eight deaths.

Some reports said the dead included monks, who are widely revered in Myanmar, and the emergence of such martyr figures could stoke public anger against the regime and escalate the violence.

As the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, the crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests over a fuel price hike has drawn increasing international pressure on the isolated regime, especially from its chief economic and diplomatic ally, China.

The United States and the European Union issued a joint statement decrying the assault on peaceful demonstrators and calling on the junta to open talks with democracy activists, including detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace laureate.

"What's going on in Burma is outrageous," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said.

The U.N. Security Council met in private to be briefed on developments, and issued a brief statement expressing concern about the violent response to demonstrations.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was sending a special envoy to the region, urged the junta "to exercise utmost restraint toward the peaceful demonstrations taking place, as such action can only undermine the prospects for peace, prosperity and stability in Myanmar."

There was no sign the government had any intention of backing down, and monks said the violence would not deter them from pressing on with what has become the most sustained anti-junta protest since a failed 1988 democracy uprising. In that crisis, soldiers shot into crowds of peaceful demonstrators, killing thousands.

John Dale, an associate faculty member of George Mason University's Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, said the involvement of monks had made it clear the demonstrations would not peter out and it was surprising the military held back this long.

"Now that it's turned violent, there's high risk activity," Dale said. "The regime signaled they are sincerely prepared to use violence."

The junta issued an edict late Tuesday banning gatherings of more than five people, but the order was ignored by democracy activists and the public alike Wednesday.

The number of protesters seemed a bit less than on Tuesday, but thousands massed at the golden Shwedagon Pagoda, including monks in cinnamon robes, students, members of Suu Kyi's democracy movement and activists waving flags emblazoned with the fighting peacock — a symbol of Myanmar's democracy movement. Large crowds of bystanders also gathered to watch.

Police fired tear gas and made some arrests trying unsuccessfully to scatter the demonstrators. Protesters marched off toward the Sule Pagoda in the heart of Yangon, but were later blocked by military trucks and security officers with riot shields, clubs and guns. Groups of marchers then fanned out into other streets, chased by security forces.

Officers fired warning shots and tear gas trying to disperse the main group and began dragging monks into army trucks — the first mass arrests since protests against the military dictatorship erupted Aug. 19.

Reporters saw some monks beaten, and an exile dissident group said about 300 monks and other protesters had been arrested in small clashes across Myanmar's biggest city.

There were reports of destruction of property but it was unclear whether it was done by demonstrators or pro-junta thugs who were seen among the soldiers and police. Witnesses said a mob burned two police motorcycles.

Myanmar's government said security forces fired when a crowd that included what it called "so-called monks" refused to disperse at the Sule Pagoda and tried to grab weapons from officers. It said police used "minimum force."

The junta statement, read on state radio and television Wednesday night, said a 30-year-old man was killed by a police bullet. It said two men aged 25 and 27 and a 47-year-old woman also were hurt when police fired, but did not specify their injuries.

Witnesses known to The Associated Press reported seeing two women and one young man with gunshot wounds.

Exiled Myanmar journalists and democracy activists released reports of higher death tolls, but the accounts could not be independently confirmed.

Khim Maung Win, deputy editor of the Democratic Voice of Burma, an opposition-run shortwave radio service based in Norway, said five monks and three civilians were reported killed and at least four seriously injured.

Zin Linn, information minister for the Washington-based National Coalition Government of the Union of Burma, which is Myanmar's self-styled government-in-exile, said at least five monks were killed.

An organization of exiled political activists in Thailand, the National League for Democracy-Liberated Area, said three monks had been confirmed dead and about 17 wounded.

Such reports, as well as photos and video taken covertly and then sent over the Internet and by other means, have helped keep the momentum of the protests going. Transmitted back into the country, the dissident views counter reports from state-controlled media ridiculing demonstrators.

Voice of Burma's chief editor, Aye Chan Naing, said activists were using the Internet and cell phones to funnel news out of Myanmar. He declined to discuss details because that could help the military disrupt the messages, saying the junta already had cut some cell phone service.

Naing said activists sometimes transmitted video one frame at a time over the Web and also hid information within seemingly innocous e-mails.

During the marches in Yangon, bystanders joined with protesters to stand up to security forces, driving them back with a barrage of bricks and bottles that scattered debris and broken glass on the street.

Demonstrators tried to shame one group of soldiers by chanting: "You are the army of the people, we are feeding you! Be just to us!"

When words failed to move the 70 soldiers and the crews of two fire trucks being used for crowd control, people began hurling stones and the line gave way to allow protesters through, many of them monks headed back to their monasteries.

"They will kill us, monks and nuns. Maybe we should go back to normal life as before," said a young nun, her back pressed against the back of a building near the scenes of chaos. But a student watching the arrival of the demonstrators said, "If they are brave, we must be brave. They risk their lives for us."

The two asked that their names not be used for fear of reprisals.

___

Associated Press writers Grant Peck in Bangkok, Thailand, and Edith M. Lederer and Carley Petesch in New York contributed to this report.

(This version CORRECTS UPDATES with additional details on protests, corrects that Yangon is not capital. AP Video.)

La jetee, cine-roman by Chris Marker

saigontoine — Sun, 23 Sep 2007 11:56:00 +0700

Nothing sorts memories from ordinary moments. They claim remembrance when they show their scars.

Chris Marker. La Jetée.

Directed by Chris Marker

Produced by Anatole Dauman

Written by Chris Marker

Starring Jean Negroni, Etienne Becker, Davos Hanich, Jacques Ledoux, Helene Chatelain

Music by Trevor Duncan

Cinematography Chris Marker

Editing by Jean Ravel

Release date(s) 1962

Running time 28 min

Country France

Language French, German

"This is the story of a man, marked by an image from his childhood. The violent scene that upset him, and whose meaning he was to grasp only years later, happened on the main jetty at Orly, the Paris airport, sometime before the outbreak of World War III. Orly, Sunday. Parents used to take their children there to watch the departing planes. On this particular Sunday, the child whose story we are telling was bound to remember the frozen sun, the setting at the end of the jetty, and a woman's face. Nothing sorts out memories from ordinary moments. Later on they do claim remembrance when they show their scars. That face he had seen was to be the only peacetime image to survive the war. Had he really seen it? Or had he invented that tender moment to prop up the madness to come? The sudden roar, the woman's gesture, the crumpling body, and the cries of the crowd on the jetty blurred by fear. Later, he knew he had seen a man die. And sometime after came the destruction of Paris. Many died. Some believed themselves to be victors. Others were taken prisoner. The survivors settled beneath Chaillot, in an underground network of galleries. Above ground, Paris, as most of the world, was uninhabitable, riddled with radioactivity. The victors stood guard over an empire of rats. The prisoners were subjected to experiments, apparently of great concern to those who conducted them. The outcome was a disappointment for some - death for others - and for others yet, madness. One day they came to select a new guinea pig from among the prisoners. He was the man whose story we are telling. He was frightened. He had heard about the Head Experimenter. He was prepared to meet Dr. Frankenstein, or the Mad Scientist. Instead, he met a reasonable man who explained calmly that the human race was doomed. Space was off-limits. The only hope for survival lay in Time. A loophole in Time, and then maybe it would be possible to reach food, medicine, sources of energy. This was the aim of the experiments: to send emissaries into Time, to summon the Past and Future to the aid of the Present. But the human mind balked at the idea. To wake up in another age meant to be born again as an adult. The shock would be too great. Having only sent lifeless or insentient bodies through different zones of Time, the inventors where now concentrating on men given to very strong mental images. If they were able to conceive or dream another time, perhaps they would be able to live in it. The camp police spied even on dreams. This man was selected from among a thousand for his obsession with an image from the past. Nothing else, at first, put stripping out the present, and its racks. They begin again. The man doesn't die, nor does he go mad. He suffers. They continue. On the tenth day, images begin to ooze, like confessions. A peacetime morning. A peacetime bedroom, a real bedroom. Real children. Real birds. Real cats. Real graves. On the sixteenth day he is on the jetty at Orly. Empty. Sometimes he recaptures a day of happiness, though different. A face of happiness, though different. Ruins. A girl who could be the one he seeks. He passes her on the jetty. She smiles at him from an automobile. Other images appear, merge, in that museum, which is perhaps that of his memory. On the thirtieth day, the meeting takes place. Now he is sure he recognizes her. In fact, it is the only thing he is sure of, in the middle of this dateless world that at first stuns him with its affluence. Around him, only fabulous materials: glass, plastic, terry cloth. When he recovers from his trance, the woman has gone. The experimenters tighten their control. They send him back out on the trail. Time rolls back again, the moment returns. This time he is close to her, he speaks to her. She welcomes him without surprise. They are without memories, without plans. Time builds itself painlessly around them. Their only landmarks are the flavor of the moment they are living and the markings on the walls. Later on, they are in a garden. He remembers there were gardens. She asks him about his necklace, the combat necklace he wore at the start of the war that is yet to come. He invents an explanation. They walk. They look at the trunk of a redwood tree covered with historical dates. She pronounces an English name he doesn't understand. As in a dream, he shows her a point beyond the tree, hears himself say, "This is where I come from ..." - and falls back, exhausted. Then another wave of Time washes over him. The result of another injection perhaps. Now she is asleep in the sun. He knows that in this world to which he has just returned for a while, only to be sent back to her, she is dead. She wakes up. He speaks again. Of a truth too fantastic to be believed he retains the essential: an unreachable country, a long way to go. She listens. She doesn't laugh. Is it the same day? He doesn't know. They shall go on like this, on countless walks in which an unspoken trust, an unadulterated trust will grow between them, without memories or plans. Up to the moment where he feels - ahead of them - a barrier. And this was the end of the first experiment. It was the starting point for a whole series of tests, in which he would meet her at different times. Sometimes he finds her in front of their markings. She welcomes him in a simple way. She calls him her Ghost. One day she seems frightened. One day she leans toward him. As for him, he never knows whether he moves toward her, whether he is driven, whether he has made it up, or whether he is only dreaming. Around the fiftieth day, they meet in a museum filled with timeless animals. Now the aim is perfectly adjusted. Thrown at the right moment, he may stay there and move without effort. She too seems tamed. She accepts as a natural phenomenon the ways of this visitor who comes and goes, who exists, talks, laughs with her, stops talking, listens to her, then disappears. Once back in the experiment room, he knew something was different. The camp leader was there. From the conversation around him, he gathered that after the brilliant results of the tests in the Past, they now meant to ship him into the Future. His excitement made him forget for a moment that the meeting at the museum had been the last. The Future was better protected than the Past. After more, painful tries, he eventually caught some waves of the world to come. He went through a brand new planet, Paris rebuilt, ten thousand incomprehensible avenues. Others were waiting for him. It was a brief encounter. Obviously, they rejected these scoriae of another time. He recited his lesson: because humanity had survived, it could not refuse to its own past the means of its survival. This sophism was taken for Fate in disguise. They gave him a power unit strong enough to put all human industry back into motion, and again the gates of the Future were closed. Sometime after his return, he was transferred to another part of the camp. He knew that his jailers would not spare him. He had been a tool in their hands, his childhood image had been used as bait to condition him, he had lived up to their expectations, he had played his part. Now he only waited to be liquidated with, somewhere inside him, the memory of a twice-lived fragment of time. And deep in this limbo, he received a message from the people of the world to come. They too traveled through Time, and more easily. Now they were there, ready to accept him as one of their own. But he had a different request: rather than this pacified future, he wanted to be returned to the world of his childhood, and to this woman who was perhaps waiting for him. Once again the main jetty at Orly, in the middle of this warm pre-war Sunday afternoon where he could not stay, he though in a confused way that the child he had been was due to be there too, watching the planes. But first of all he looked for the woman's face, at the end of the jetty. He ran toward her. And when he recognized the man who had trailed him since the underground camp, he understood there was no way to escape Time, and that this moment he had been granted to watch as a child, which had never ceased to obsess him, was the moment of his own death."

Where’s Vietnam (3)

saigontoine — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 15:35:00 +0700

The original text ‘Viet’ by Harvey Bialy

« The effigy of the body of the deceased is made by dressing a stool, block of wood, or other suitable object in the clothes of the deceased ; and where the face should be.»

If the deceased were a man Return to the house of death after the 49th day

If the family be rich Return to the house of death after the 49th day

If the deceased were a man

Continue to offer food until the 49th day

If hte deceased The corpse Posture So

If the deceased were a man

A man i kan Amer i can A man i can A Man

« The corpse after being laid upon its back on a sheet of cloth spread over a framework . . . is covered with a w.h.i.t.e cloth. »

Death in his back Three army surgeons

Working with Specially fashioned tools Carefully made A jagged incision in His back & W/ a forceps mounted on A long ox-goad ? Deftly removed The grenade Then Sewed him back Up Sewed up his back ?

The vietnamese peasant went home Slightly numb from the procaine But otherwise feeling fine

Death in his back

If he was a man

He was

A spokesman said It cd not be determined why The marine shot him A spokesman said It cd not be determined why American planes for The second straight day Bombed a friendly village A spokesman said It cd not be determined why Exactly the viet cong were And further that From the air Viet nam & viet cong Villages Cannot be distinguished

A spokesman sd

The viet cong carry off their dead To deceive us

If the deceased were a man Bury him Put a white cloth Over him

« the men who perform this part of the burial belong to a special caste and being regarded as unclean are shunned by the other Tibetans. »

even the bones the birds have stripped them of flesh are disposed of mixed with flour kneaded into a calcium dough

the birds eat it too

they will eat anything

now

the farmers that is

they can steal from the birds

the bodies even the bones

the score after yesterdays battle :

                     Viet Cong                           American

403 200

         killed or wounded          killed or wounded

The Birds : very happy but Too full To fly

A spokesman sd This is the kind of fighting we came here to do

A spokesman sd It was a stunning victory A spokesman sd The viet cong Can take their roll call in a phone booth A gi sd Used to be you had to stand in line to Use the toilet

A spokesman sd A spokesman sd A spokesman sd A spokesman sd A spkesmn sd A s k mn sd A s m sd The score :

403 killed or wounded vs 200 killed or wounded After three innings Minnesota ahead 4 to 2 & Sandy Koufax has note eaten for 24 hrs

The score :

403 killed or wounded vs 200 killed or wounded

A spokesman sd

Ho Ch Minh Ho Chi Min O Chi Minh Mao Tse Tung Mao Tse Tung

LBJ threw out the first ball ? Ho Min Nesota ahead 4 to 2

403 killed or wounded

200 killed or wounded

A spokesman sd

It is very difficult to Distinguish viet namese from Viet cong Especially from The air

A spokesman sd

The sky was unusually free of birds yesterday

LBJ LBJ

A spokesman sd We soon announce Wheter Lucy Baines Cd marry

A spokesman sd

It is very difficult to Distinguish viet namese from Viet cong w/ out a program

Minnesota was Very happy until The seventh game

If the deceased were a man Return to the house of death after the 7 x 7 th day

LISTEN SPOKESMAN

IT IS WRITTEN

If the evil is not recognized by the first day Nor yet by the fourteenth day

« The shapes of the Lord of Death will come filling the worlds system. They will come having their upper teeth biting their lower lips ; their eyes glassy, their hairs tied on the back of their heads ; big bellied, narrow-waisted ; holding the s.c.o.r.e in their hands ; giving utterance from their mouths the sounds of s.t.r.i.k.e s.l.a.y licking brains, drinking blood tearing heads from crpses tearing out the hearts they will come filling the world. »

The Obscure

saigontoine — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 13:43:00 +0700

An MK 47 production, in association with Cinerent, Atelier Lu. (International sales: MK 47, Beijing.) Produced by Liu Yiwei. Directed by Lu Yue. Screenplay, Lu, Liu Yiwei.

With: Wang Zhiwen, Wang Tong, A Cheng, Lin Bai, Xu Xing, Chen Cun, Xu Lan, Zhao Mei, Fang Fang, Ding Tian, Wang Shuo, Ma Yuan, Mian Mian.

"The Obscure" is certainly that. Blending of documentary and fiction, centered on a writers' colloquium in southwest China, this will be tough sledding for non-Sinophiles, but it does leave lingering emotional traces. Reminiscent in its fictional bits of d.p.-turned-helmer Lu Yue's first feature, "Mr. Zhao" (1998), this is fest fare that could travel to specialty channels and Sinophile gatherings. Setting is a 1999 gathering of some of China's best-known scribes to gab about Poetry -- which they do for 30 minutes before the fictional story even starts. It's fascinating stuff if you know the writers and are interested in the subject; most auds will start to tune in when the colloquium organizer, Chen Xiao (Wang Tong), recognizes an old flame, Zhao Zixuan (Wang Zhiwen), who's in the same hotel on business. Between more academic gabbing, the film crosscuts to their tentative get-together, reminiscences and regrets: a slowly involving story, beautifully played by the two thesps, that does deliver emotionally. A cheeky ending half-succeeds in trying to unite the pic's two sides. HD package is OK, though colors look gray and washed out on the bigscreen. Chinese title simply means "A Story."

More than one option __(Co) Lu Yue (Person) Lu Yue (Person) Lu Yue More than one option (Co) Fang Fang (Person) Feng Fang (Person) Fang Fang Camera (color, HD), Wang Tianlin; editor, Zhai Rui; art directors, Wang Dongfang, Cui Fuqiang; costume designer, An Bin. Reviewed at Venice Film Festival (Horizons, competing), Sept. 7, 2007. Original title: Xiaoshuo. Mandarin dialogue. Running time: 90 MIN.__

City drivers fail to heed traffic safety month

saigontoine — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 10:46:00 +0700

(18-09-2007) HA NOI — September is Viet Nam’s traffic safety month but preliminary figures show that the message has fallen on deaf ears, especially in Ha Noi and HCM City.

Hospitals report no fall in the number of traffic deaths and injuries although complete statistics are not yet available.

And traffic police say jams have increased in the country’s two major cities since the first week of September.

Early figures show that 987 people were killed and 746 suffered serious and minor injures in more than 1,000 road accidents during August.

The numbers offer a glimmer of hope because they were slightly less than from the same month of last year.

Capital gridlock

In Ha Noi, major routes have been gripped in gridlock since September 1 – the beginning of the second month since Government Resolution 32 introduced a series of measures intended to curb the carnage.

Resident Le Thanh Hung complained that he spent almost three hours on Wednesday, September 5 and Monday, September 10, travelling the 12 km to his home in the southern Thanh Xuan District from his office in the central Hoan Kiem District.

"All the major roads to my home were blocked by cars and motorbikes," he said adding that the traffic jams had prevented him from collecting his son after school.

Hung managed to escape a major jam between Pham Ngoc Thach and Chua Boc streets but was halted in a narrower street because many others had chosen the same route.

"I saw a few traffic policemen but with so many vehicles and people they could do nothing," he said.

He was used to regular jams but not the snarl of those particular two days.

Ha Noi Public Security Department director Nguyen Duc Nhanh offered several explanations for the serious jams.

School had resumed and parents had to deliver and collect their children about the same time as officials and workers started or finished their day.

Heavy rain had caused floods and detours.

The easing of rules for the registration of new vehicles earlier in the year had prompted a rapid increase in the number of new motorbikes and cars on the city’s roads.

The city now had more than 2 million motorbikes and 200,000 cars and the new registration rules meant the numbers were unlikely to fall soon, Nhanh said.

The city also had many roads under construction with work way behind schedule.

Nhanh said measures to control the traffic chaos had included the doubling of registration fees for second vehicles; increased penalties for traffic violations and more and regular traffic patrols.

More patrols would force people to honour traffic laws that were usually ignored when drivers and riders thought they could avoid doing so.

The city administrators had proposed staggered hours for all workers and students but it was not known when the new system would be introduced.

HCM City

Similar jams are happening in HCM City where on many roads people can walk faster than those travelling by vehicle.

The Transport and Public Works Department reports that rush-hour traffic averages 3kph compared with 6-8kph off-peak.

The HCM City People’s Committee says transport infrastructure is overburdened from an increasing number of vehicles and by the number of immigrants who arrive each month to look for work.

Road Traffic Police say 280,000 motorbikes and 20,000 cars were registered in the first eight months of this year taking the number of vehicles travelling the city’s roads to 3.5 million.

Road building, or widening, including work on the drainage system, has contributed to the traffic jams.

Financial loss

Yearly financial losses from traffic jams will continue to grow, warns the dean of the HCM City University of Technology’s Transportation Technology Department, Pham Xuan Mai.

The prevailing yearly estimate was VND14,000 billion, about US$875 million, represented by lost time at work, medical costs due to pollution, and loss of profits.

Many city businesses say they lose money because of traffic bottlenecks.

"Motorbikes using the pavement in front of our shop prevent us from doing business in a normal way," said a clothing-shop owner on Nguyen Kiem Street, Go Vap District.

City officials say that more money has had to be spent to hire extra traffic police and volunteer youth who act as traffic wardens at street intersections.

Traffic Police commander Senior Lieutenant Colonel Pham Van Thinh says 500 volunteers will be assigned to city streets to control traffic because there are not enough police.

The policeman suggests that the People’s Committee reduces traffic jams by staggering working hours.

But traffic jams will continue at least until the subway is finished.

The work is scheduled for completion by 2020.

Waterways

HCM City uses more waterborne transport than anywhere else in Viet Nam and a campaign to stiffen the regulations – punish violations and provide ferry passengers with safety gear – started this week.

The Transport Ministry’s Waterways Department director Tran Dac Suu, says the campaign is aimed at the promotion of positive changes among waterway commuters

About 70 per cent of the city’s goods are carried by water making it necessary to improve traffic-safety awareness among commuters, boat owners and crew.

The city has more than 200 landings, including overload jetties that berth a high density of cargo vessels, small boats and tourist craft.

The city’s water police and inspectors have toured the city’s docks and major waterways encouraging people to follow the safety regulations for themselves; their passengers and property.

Water police also inspected water craft for safety equipment and ownership registration in Vinh Long Province.

The province has more than 1,700km of waterways.

Its water police saythat although there were no serious accidents during the first eight months of this year, the possibility is high if safety regulations are ignored.

Patrols were also increased and the need for safety emphasised in central Nghe An where 19 students died in an accident on the water while going to school at this time last year. — VNS

Immediate measures ordered

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung has instructed all ministries, government agencies, provincial administrations and the National Traffic Safety Committee to immediately activate traffic-safety measures. Their job is to have the public understand the urgent measures of Government Resolution 32 effective from last month, he says in a letter sent last Friday. This is to be done through outdoor advertisements, brochures, leaflets and slogans to warn that safety helmets will be compulsory for all motorbike riders and their passengers from December. Government officials, public servants and Viet Nam Communist Party members in all government offices are required to set an example. The Deputy Prime Minister asks the Public Security Ministry to increase patrols and inspections with the focus on speed, overloads, underage riders and drivers and unregistered transport vehicles. Hung has instructed the Ministry of Education and Training, which has responsibility for about 22 million students, to focus on encouraging high school, college and university students to obey the traffic laws and practise traffic safety. Appropriate ministries are responsible for the quality of safety helmets and the National Traffic Safety Committee has oversight and review of the programme. Also on Friday, National Traffic Safety Committee chairman Ho Nghia Dung said eight working groups had been formed to start a massive inspection programme for implementation of Resolution 32. The committee would first ask riders and passengers to wear helmets and then check on passenger transport including bus and boat. Other issues such as traffic-law education; the checking of licence procedure and publicity campaigns would follow.— VNS

Filmmakers find funds from abroad

saigontoine — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 10:27:00 +0700

VNS, (19-09-2007)

Several Vietnamese filmmakers have managed to secure financial assistance from abroad, mainly from France and the US, after the Government cut subsidies to the film industry.

"Getting State funds for films is very difficult," director Vinh Son said. "Only a few films are selected each year for the subsidy of about VND2 billion (US$123,000) per film.

"The money is not enough and we must tie up with foreign companies or get assistance from foreign organisations," he added.

A dozen organisations globally offer assistance for making films, according to local filmmakers.

Last year’s Trang Noi Day Gieng (A Moon Mirroring Well) by Son got $206,000 from Fonds Sud Cinema and $111,000 from Fonds Francophone, both of France.

The two funds have, in the last few years, financed many Vietnamese films including Me Thao Thoi Vang Bong (Me Thao in the Golden Days) and Thoi Xa Vang (A Distant Past).

A Distant Past won the Emile Guimet Award from the French National Museum of Asian Arts at the 2004 International Asian Film Festival in Vesoul, France. Based on the best-selling novel of the same name by Le Luu, the film offers an intimate portrait of the lives of young men in a rural Vietnamese village during the 1970s.

"However, it’s not easy for Vietnamese films to get foreign financial assistance," award-winning director Bui Thac Chuyen pointed out.

Trai Tim Be Bong (A Small Heart) by the Viet Nam Feature Films Company beat off 34 films from 21 countries to obtain funds from the US’s Global Film Initiative.

Chuyen is renowned for his interesting scripts and fundraising skills. He managed to get French assistance for several films like Xam (Beggar Music) and Cuoc Xe Dem (A Night Ride).

"I seek funds from foreign organisations for my films as soon as I complete a script," he said.

"I’m looking for aid for Choi Voi (Lonely) which I’ll make soon," he said, adding he needed $300,000 to augment the funds he had from other sources.

His Song Trong So Hai (Living in Fear) won an award for best new talent at the ninth Shanghai International Film Festival in 2006. In the same year, the film won the annual Golden Kite award for best film from the Viet Nam Cinematography Association.

The film is about a former Sai Gon regime soldier who earns a living by clearing unexplored mines to support his family of two wives and five children.

Chuyen said filmmakers had to traverse a long path before being able to obtain assistance from foreign organisations which expected beneficiaries to have been acknowledged by international critics and feted at prestigious film festivals.

However, he said that many Vietnamese films had managed to win the hearts of audiences in Viet Nam and abroad with their innovative themes and content. "This will make it easier for film-makers to get foreign aid," he said.

He and others in the film industry said that a $350,000 programme funded by the US’s Ford Foundation for Vietnamese film-makers over the next two years was truly good news for the industry. — VNS

3 men with the movie camera..

saigontoine — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:49:00 +0700

Me, Nicolas and KM, just to replay the camera..

National film fest seeks commercial entries

saigontoine — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 10:14:00 +0700

Organisers of the up-coming 15th Na-tional Film Festival are encouraging more private studios to bring their movies to the festival, according to Lai Van Sinh, head of the Cinema Department of the Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism.

But some big-name private film studios, like Phuoc Sang and Thien Ngan, haven’t yet decided whether to take part in the event to be held on November 21-24 in the northern province of Nam Dinh.

"We know that private studios are not eager to compete at the festival because it isn’t thought to be suitable for commercial movies," said Sinh.

He noted that Thien Ngan’s film Nhung Co Gai Chan Dai (Long-Legged Girls) was the last private studio production to receive an award at the festival, winning second prize at the 2004 festival held in the Central Highlands province of Dac Lac.

This year, the film Dong Mau Anh Hung (The Rebel), produced by Chanh Phuong Studio, is among the few privately produced films slated to compete.

The festival is currently scheduled to show more than 100 films, including 18 features, 11 short films, 22 animated shorts and 54 documentaries, making it the largest festival in the past three years.

Movies from the State-owned studios do not generally perform well at the box office. Many, however, have won acclaim on the film festival circuit, including Song Trong So Hai (Living in Fear); Chuyen Cua Pao (Pao’s Story); Mua Len Trau (Buffalo Boy); Ha Noi, Ha Noi; Gio Thien Duong (Wind in Paradise) and Chop Mat Cung So Phan (Fated Moment).

Living in Fear and Pao’s Story have screened at festivals around the world but found few audiences on domestic screens. Buffalo Boy, directed by overseas Vietnamese Nguyen Vo Nghiem Minh, debuted at the 14th National Film Festival and went on to garner several prizes at international festivals.

Productions by private film studios that have screened at the National Film Festival over the past three years include De Muon (Hired Pregnant); Ao Lua Ha Dong (White Silk Dress); and Hai Trong Mot (Two in One).

This year, National Film Festival organisers have invited actors and directors from Russia, China, South Korea, Laos, Cambodia, and the US to attend the festival. Tadao Sato, chairman of Fukuoka International Film Festival in Japan, has accepted an invitation to attend.

— VNS (18-09-2007)

Javayarma VII

saigontoine — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 11:34:00 +0700

Angkor, Cambodia : Javayarma VII

Motown spirit (2)

saigontoine — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 11:18:00 +0700

James Brown / Public Enemy #1, Part 1

Saigon monsoon (2)

saigontoine — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 10:49:00 +0700

A sound of the monsoon, Saigon, August 07,

saigon rain #01, August 07

I Ain't Got No Quarrel With The VietCong..

saigontoine — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 10:40:00 +0700

"I Ain't Got No Quarrel With The VietCong...
No VietCong Ever Called Me Nigger"
Muhammad Ali, 1966

No, I am not going 10,000 miles to help murder kill and burn other people to simply help continue the domination of white slavemasters over dark people the world over. This is the day and age when such evil injustice must come to an end.
Muhammad Ali

Motown spirit (3)
James Brown / Public Enemy #1

Resistance to the Vietnam and protest took many forms : demonstrations all over the world since the famous Jane Fonda's call from Radio Hanoi, for peace..
Muhammad Ali, 'the greatest', on August 23, 1966, embarked on his biggest "fight" when he applied with the Selective Service for conscientious objector status.
He used his voice against the Vietnam War, willing to speak out against racism in the US and this famous talk about the living conditions of the Third World.

Thanks to AAVW for the resources.

In another part of the 'black movement', the Black Panther Party also fought against this illegal war, by preeches and denunciations like these following posters edited in the early 70's.

Objective ?

saigontoine — Fri, 14 Sep 2007 10:52:00 +0700

Me & KM LO, Acoustic Cafe, Saigon,

HCM City to teach traffic rules with cartoons

saigontoine — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 16:02:00 +0700

VietNamNet Bridge – The HCM City Department of Transport and Public Works on September 12 introduced a set of cartoon books on traffic safety. The department plans to provide around 45,000 sets free of charge to children less than 16 years old.

HCM City to teach traffic rules with cartoons

12:58' 13/09/2007 (GMT+7)13/09/2007 (GMT+7)

This set of cartoons includes three volumes, entitled: The city at your convenience, The city in dreams, and Safety, right!

Instead of teaching traffic rules by unattractive traditional methods, the department hopes that those cartoon books will simplify the skills to use traffic lamps, traffic signals, wearing helmets when riding motorbikes, etc. by simple pictures and language, which is suitable for children.

The department will present those cartoon books to children of up to 16 years old, who will attend the Traffic Safety Camp on September 19 at the Zoological Botanical Garden in HCM City.

More than 2,000 students from 40 secondary and high schools in HCM City will take part in this camp, which will have various activities and contests related to knowledge about traffic safety.

This event is part of the second Traffic Safety Month but this is the first time the camp has been organized for children.

“We hope that through this camp, not only children but their parents and siblings will have more knowledge about traffic safety and urban traffic culture,” said Director of the HCM City Department of Transport and Public Works, Tran Quang Phuong.

He said that the Department of Transport and Public Works will combine with the local Department of Education and Training to organize similar camps in all districts and to teach traffic rules at general schools.

According to statistics of the HCM City Traffic Police Agency, nearly 7,000 people were killed in traffic accidents in the south since 2006, accounting for 50% of the fatal cases caused by traffic accidents in Vietnam. Notably, up to 40% of them are less than 20 years old.

(Source: VNE)

The moon in the deep of the well (2)

saigontoine — Wed, 12 Sep 2007 17:09:00 +0700

Shooting in Hue, Tet 2006,

9/11

saigontoine — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 16:55:00 +0700

''No comment on September 11th BDay.. When the counter from NGO's in Irak annoucing over 1 million dead people...''

This one belongs to the war propaganda : Irak body count