Hanoi, in the Japan­ese indus­tri­al zone: two young women who have left their vil­lage strug­gle to escape tem­po­rary work and short-term con­tracts. Becom­ing a real worker is a dream, which should be a source of pride and a guar­an­tee of dignity.

Thao Tran Thi Phuong, born in 1977 in Viet­nam, Tran Phuong Thao ini­tial­ly stud­ied for­eign trade and inter­pre­ta­tion in Hanoi. In 2002, she moved to France to fulfil her dream of becom­ing a doc­u­men­tary film­mak­er. After grad­u­at­ed in Polit­i­cal Sci­ence in Paris, she stud­ied doc­u­men­tary film tech­nics and writ­ing in Poitiers Uni­ver­si­ty. Back in Viet­nam, she joined dif­fer­ent Varan Viet­nam work­shops since 2005 as trans­la­tor, trainee, then tutor. WORKERS’ DREAMS attend­ed many inter­na­tion­al fes­ti­vals and was award­ed at the Cinema du Reel 2007. Since 2011, she has direct­ed sev­er­al doc­u­men­tary projects in col­lab­o­ra­tion Swann Dubus includ­ing WITH OR WITHOUT ME - White Goose Award at DMZ Docs 2012 and FINDING PHONG - Grand Prix Nanook- Jean Rouch at 34th Inter­na­tion­al Fes­ti­val Jean Rouch 2015. Their work exam­ines the human dimen­sions of the grand themes in Viet­nam’s rapid­ly chang­ing society.

A broth­er and sister, aged eleven and eight respec­tive­ly, are sur­vivors of a deadly cyclone on the island of Min­danao in Decem­ber 2011. With extreme mod­esty, Kiri films their child­hood … read more

At a bend in the Rue de Charonne, I come across the letter car­ri­er start­ing his second daily round on foot. He wants me to accom­pa­ny him. It’s very, very … read more

In 2022, a col­lec­tive from the Sudan Film Fac­to­ry began a project to por­tray some people in Sudan’s cap­i­tal, ini­ti­at­ed by British film­mak­er Phil Cox (Native Voice Films). In the … read more

Ini­tial­ly, Gul­noza thought she knew her­self well enough and was open enough to start a film project about the rela­tion­ship between her and Denis, her boyfriend. She didn’t want to … read more

Zamira is fes­tive­ly attired, singing in a choir. A line from a love song poses the ques­tion “What is my pur­pose in life here on earth?”, becom­ing the guid­ing theme … read more

The night is still black. In the narrow beam of her torch, Quralai counts the money for the sweet corn she is about to buy from the pick­ers. At home, … read more

Can pass­ing through a forest change the fate of a 16-year-old girl overnight? The lives of Runa and her family are now divid­ed into before and after cross­ing this forest. … read more

Koka is a pretty grown-up kid who lives with his father and two dogs in a coastal vil­lage on the Bering Sea. Under his father’s edgy instruc­tions, he helps with … read more

The film unfolds as a poignant explo­ration of the film­mak­er’s jour­ney toward under­stand­ing and accept­ing the pro­found sense of belong­ing tied to space and time. It chron­i­cles the moth­er’s expe­ri­ence … read more