Lovers Nam and Việt work deep underground in a Vietnam coal mine, where gruelling work and moments of intimacy coexist in the darkness. But looming over the two men’s relationship is the exodus of people desperately choosing illicit routes to a better life abroad, and what migration could mean for them. Split into two halves and captured gorgeously on 16mm film, Trương Minh Quý’s tender picture depicts not just youthful desires, hopes and fears, but a nation reckoning with the traumas of war and people smuggling. Viet and Nam won the Best Director and the FIPRESCI Prize at the Singapore International Film Festival. It was also featured in Un Certain Regard at the Cannes Film Festival.

The screening on 18 April and 20 April will be followed by a conversation between Trương Minh Quý and M+ Curator of Moving Image Chanel Kong in English.

Trương Minh Quý (b. 1990, Vietnam) came from Buôn Ma Thuột, a small city in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. Quý lives and works around the world, in the vibrancy of memories and present moments. His narratives and images, lying between documentary and fiction, personal and impersonal, draw on the landscape of his homeland, childhood memories, and the historical context of Vietnam. In his films, he has experimented with combining abstract concept and images with realistic improvisations during shooting.