MEIN VIETNAM

Thi Hien Mai | Tim Ellrich | 2020 | Germany | 70’ | Documentary

Bay and Tam are a Vietnamese couple who have been living in limbo for 30 years: physically in Germany but virtually in Vietnam. They work as office cleaners by night and rarely come into contact with German society. By day they spend all their time online, maintaining a virtual connection to their homeland via Skype and karaoke chatrooms. But when a storm destroys their house in Vietnam — that held the promise of their eventual return —, their virtual bubble bursts and they are torn on where to call home. Mein Vietnam is a vivid illustration of living in two places at once, and that duality’s consequences on marriage, family and a sense of belonging.



Thi Hien Mai was born in 1989 in Munich. She studied art history and art education at the Goethe University in Frankfurt. After working with the artist Ai Weiwei and as an assistant in various cultural management projects, she now works at the German Film Institute. In this balance between these various fields, she would like to make cultural heritage more accessible and visible to all. Mein Vietnam is her first collaboration with Tim Ellrich.

Tim Ellrich, born 1989 in Osnabrück, is a German filmmaker. After moving to Vienna where he studied philosophy, theater, film and media, he started producing his own films and founded the production company Coronado Film. His films have been screened at festivals all over the world and have won various awards, including the Jury Prize at the International Short Film Festival in Clermont-Ferrand.