These are our ten recommended feature films from the Ho Chi Minh City International Film Festival which is taking place from April 6 – 13, 2024 in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

Borrowed Time by Choy Ji – China | 2023 – 93 minutes

At a fruit market in Hong Kong, Mak searches for a father she hasn’t seen in twenty years. (Mubi)

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Broker by Hirokazu Kore-eda – Korea | 2022 – 130 minutes

On a rainy night in Busan, So-young leaves her baby Woo-sung outside a ‘baby box’, a safe place set up in Korean churches for new mothers to leave unwanted infants. Instead, he’s picked up by Sang-hyun who runs an unofficial adoption brokerage and plans to find him a new home. (Mubi)

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City of Wind by Lkhagvadulam Purev-Ochir – Mongolia, France, Portugal, Netherlands, Germany | 2023 – 104 minutes

Ze, a 17-year-old, studies hard at school to succeed in the cold, callous society of modern Mongolia. When Ze encounters Maralaa, his senses are awakened and another reality seems possible. (Mubi)

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Dreaming & Dying by Nelson Yeo – Singapore, Indonesia | 2023 – 77 minutes

Three middle aged individuals are forced to confront their inner demons as a long buried love triangle between them resurfaces. (Mubi)

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It’s Okay! by Hye-young Kim – Korea | 2023 – 102 minutes

One year after the tragic loss of her mother, In-young finds herself without a home. She takes shelter in the basement of her dance school, but her secret sanctuary is in peril when the choreographer, Seol-ah, discovers her. (Mubi)

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Love is A Gun by Hong-Chi Lee – Hong Kong, Taiwan | 2023 – 81 minutes

Since his release from prison, Fan Shu (Sweet Potato) has been content to run a little business with a meager income by the sea, disregarding the advice of others to the contrary. (Mubi)

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Oasis of Now by Chee Sum Chia – Malaysia, Singapore, France | 2023 – 90 minutes

Hanh, an undocumented Vietnamese in KL secretly meets with her daughter who lives with the local adoptive parents, She continues her door-to-door housekeeping in an apartment area in Kuala Lumpur, where the decades old buildings are home to both locals and foreign. (Mubi)

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Solids by the Seashore by Patiparn Boontarig – Thailand | 2023 – 93 minutes

The Southern Thai town of Songkhla is under threat from coastal erosion. It is in this place that Muslim poet Shati (Ilada Pitsuwan) meets artist Fon (Rawipa Srisanguan), who has traveled from Bangkok for an exhibit bringing awareness to the impending environmental disaster. Shati is torn between her religious upbringing and a burgeoning affection for Fon, and faces an inner turmoil reflected in the chaos brought on by the monsoons. Casually melding folklore with modern concerns, director Boontarig employs a magical realist approach to sort through the eternal conflict between faith and identity. (QCinema 2023)

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The Gospel of the Beast by Sheron Dayoc – Philippines | 2023 – 85 minutes

When 15-year-old Mateo accidentally kills a classmate, he runs away with a man he barely knows, Berto, with whom he creates a unique father-son relationship – where Mateo learns the harrowing realities of life, death, and beasthood. (Mubi)

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Waiting for the Light to Change by Linh Tran – USA | 2022 – 89 minutes

Over the course of a week-long beachside getaway, Amy, having recently undergone dramatic weight loss, finds herself wrestling between loyalty to her best friend Kim and her attraction to Kim’s new boyfriend. (Mubi)

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More information: https://hiff.vn/