Yellow Flowers on the Green Grass

Based on Nguyễn Nhật Ánh’s award-winning book, Victor Vu’s adaptation is pure poetry, telling a breathtakingly beautiful tale of childhood, innocence, and brotherhood. As the title suggests, there is something deeply elemental and timeless about the story, which could have been set in any time period (it takes place in the late 1980s in the Vietnamese countryside). The film is the almost mythological tale of Thieu (Thịnh Vinh) and his younger brother Tuong (Trọng Khang). As he finds himself at the threshold of adulthood, Thieu is experiencing the first pangs of love and jealousy. Tuong’s youthful purity and innocence sets his older brother, à la Cain to Abel, into a jealous rage over the attentions of the young, equally pure girl next door, Moon (Thanh Mỹ). As his jealousy eats away like the green-eyed monster it is, violence erupts, innocence is lost, and redemption must be sought.