A Vietnamese tourist falls through a mine shaft into the multiverse and finds... better snacks?
To experience snow and learn German, the young Vietnamese woman Trúc Lâm moves to a little town in the Erz Mountains. During a guided tour of a mine, she leaves her group and reaches the other side of the mountain through a secondary shaft. The world there is similar to the one she left – only all the people are different. She meets Duc, who is also from Vietnam and whose parents have an Asian snack bar. And she meets a mysterious spirit who offers to make a deal with her to enable her return to her old world.
Cinematography
Erz Mountains shot like a snow globe hiding a secret door.
Writing
Magical realism that actually feels magical, not pretentious.
Acting
Nano Nguyen carries two worlds in one searching glance.
Director
Claudia Tuyết Scheffel
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Director Claudia Tuyết Scheffel explores Vietnamese-German identity through the lens of East German mining towns, a rarely depicted collision of diaspora and Ostalgie.
The mine shaft as portal echoes German fairy tales (Bergmännlein legends) while subverting them — the 'other world' is just another version of mundane reality, not a magical escape.
CZ
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