SCREENINGS
LIVE SCORED PERFORMANCES
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UK TOUR as part of Star Nhà Ease: Vietnamese Cinema Season
Sunday 19 May 2024
FACT, Cinema in the City at Paragon Arts Liverpool
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
Friday 17 May 2024
MAC Birmingham
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
Thursday 16 May 2024
Rich Mix London
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
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VIETNAM PREMIERE
The Vietnam film premiere is part of DUST & METAL: CONNECTIONS IN SOUND AND VISION, a project implemented by TPD Center and Live Cinema UK, supported by the British Council as part of the UK/Viet Nam Season 2023.
The premiere was accompanied with film workshops for young creatives in Hanoi and HCMC resulting in a series of ‘One Minute Remix’ films that utilised audio-visual material from ‘Dust & Metal’.
17 October 2023, 8pm
Monsoon Music Festival Khán phòng Ngụy Như Kon Tum – 19 Lê Thánh Tông, Hoàn Kiếm, Hà Nội · Register HERE
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
20 October 2023, 7.30pm
The Shade Nam Thi House, 152 Nam Kỳ Khởi Nghĩa, Quận 1, TP. Ho Chi Minh City · Register HERE
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
DUST & METAL (2022) is a creative documentary feature film by British director Esther Johnson, produced by Johnson and Live Cinema UK and funded by the British Council. The project was created by a unique partnership between Hanoi-based Vietnam Film Institute, and The Centre for Assistance and Development of Movie Talents TPD
DUST & METAL presents stories of ‘freedom’ in Vietnam past and present told through the lens of the country’s ubiquitous mode of transport: the motorbike. Through a unique partnership with the Vietnam Film Institute to digitise rare archive film, this British Council funded project is an unmissable audiovisual live cinema experience. Repositioning archive film, contemporary footage with a live score composed and performed by San Francisco-based Vietnamese artist Xinh Xô, and sound design by Hanoi-based artist Nguyễn Nhung. The script integrates extracts from oral history interviews Johnson made with eminent Vietnamese filmmaker Trần Văn Thủy; and with visual artist Đặng Ái Việt.
Esther Johnson (MA, RCA) is director and co-producer of feature films ‘Dust & Metal’ and ‘Asunder’. Esther’s poetic portraits focus on alternative social, marginal, and micro-histories. The repositioning of archival material is explored as a way of looking at intangible cultural heritage and of addressing the relationship between memory and storytelling. The research and collection of oral histories is used throughout her work, as are participatory methods and collaboration. She is Professor of Film & Media Arts in the Art, Design and Media Research Centre at Sheffield Hallam University, UK and is former recipient of the Philip Leverhulme Research Prize.
Xinh Xô is an acclaimed Vietnamese electronic musician with numerous collaborations in many top chart records of Vietnamese acclaimed artists and is currently Director of Audio and Music Technology at the University of Silicon Valley, USA. Xinh Xô’s compositions have been selected to be performed throughout the U.S., and in Europe, Australia, and South America including Sonorities Festival of Contemporary Music, Australasian Computer Music Conference, Electronic Music Midwest Festival, PNEM Sound Art Festival, San Francisco Electronic Music Festival, International Electroacoustic Music Festival of the Conservatory of Santa Cecilia, Monsoon Music Festival, Sheffield DocFest.
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WORLD PREMIERE
27 June 2022, 8pm
Sheffield DocFest Sheffield City Hall, Memorial Hall
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson, Composer/Performer Xo Xinh and Producer Lisa Brook
‘Esther Johnson’s film brings together a trove of archive and contemporary footage for a thrilling, unorthodox portrait of Vietnam, screened with live music composed by Xo Xinh.
Between tourist promotions and Hollywood films lies another Vietnam, whose stunning landscape has been evocatively captured from the country’s most accessible form of transport: the motorbike. Like her ground-breaking 2016 work Asunder, Johnson’s new film employs old and new footage in inventive ways to challenge preconceived stereotypes. It also explores the role of the motorbike – often the only suitable mode of transport for navigating Vietnam’s vast arterial system of tiny country roads – within the country’s history and culture.
Accompanying Johnson’s evocative montage is Xo Xinh’s electronic score, performed live, conveying in equal measure the film’s sense of wonder.’
HOLOGRAM MUSIC PERFORMANCES
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In response to the rise of ‘hologram’ performances from ABBA to Elvis, the University of Nottingham and Live Cinema UK have developed a portable hologram cabinet, allowing US-based Vietnamese musician Xinh Xô to ‘perform’ his soundtrack along with the film, before joining live for a Q&A along with director Esther Johnson (in person!). Mirroring the combination of old archive and new footage in Dust & Metal, the hologram cabinet is based on the 150-year-old Pepper’s Ghost illusion, demonstrating a new adaptation of old technology colliding in a unique audiovisual experience.
Developed in partnership with the University of Nottingham.
26 June 2024
Broadway Nottingham
plus Q&A with director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
6 June 2024
Watershed Bristol
plus Q&A with director Esther Johnson and Composer/Performer Xinh Xô
FILM FESTIVALS
20—22 September 2024
Sea Change Film Festival Isle of Tiree, Inner Hebrides, Scotland
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
Sea Change is Scotland’s only annual film festival dedicated to powering women in film.
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46th Edition, 3 Continents Film Festival Cinema Katorza, Nantes, France
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
‘Dust & Metal’ will screen in the Anthology of Vietnamese Cinema in which audiences in France were given the chance to see many rare titles from the Vietnam Film Institute, including feature films from which clips were integrated in ‘Dust & Metal’. “A montage film elaborated from Vietnamese news images and film excerpts (of which some are presented in this retrospective) originating from the Vietnam Film Institute’s collections, Dust & Metal literally spans the story of a country by borrowing as much from these archives as from the country’s most used mode of transport: the two-wheeled vehicle (bike, motorbike, scooter). A symbol of Vietnam and of its history, two-wheeled vehicles are the marker of movement and of this society’s resilience, taking part in its definitions of work, class, travel, technology and freedom.” Festival Curator Jérôme Baron
11 and 12 May 2023
Da Nang Asian Film Festival (DANAFF)
Galaxy cinema and CGV cinema, Da Nang, Vietnam
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21 April 2023, 5.30pm
Reel Documentary Film Festival Phoenix Cinema, Leicester
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
97 million people · 45 million motorbikes, a cinematic journey across Vietnam by motorbike. Through the repositioning of difficult to access archive film, contemporary footage, and a contemporary score makes this rare archive film available to new audiences, illuminating unfamiliar histories of Vietnam.
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WORLD PREMIERE WITH 5.1 SOUND MIX
9 November 2022, 9pm
Leeds International Film Festival Vue at The Light, Leeds
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson and Producer Lisa Brook
‘We’re delighted to welcome director Esther Johnson and producer Lisa Brook for an introduction and Q&A.
An illuminating and highly creative documentary featuring past and present stories of freedom in Vietnam, Esther Johnson’s Dust and Metal combines archive film, contemporary footage, and a stunning soundtrack to highlight an unorthodox history of Vietnam. Showcasing motorbikes at the very core of Vietnam’s recent history, this unique film, directed by Esther Johnson, swoops and swoons to the sounds of engines and horns while paying homage to the country’s remarkable cinematic history, creating an unparalleled symphony of Vietnamese life.’
CINEMA SCREENINGS
Friday 26 July 2024
Showroom Workstation Sheffield
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
Tuesday 25 June 2024
Hyde Park Picturehouse Leeds
Tuesday 18 June 2024
Tyneside Cinema Newcastle
plus Intro with Director Esther Johnson
Saturday 8 June 2024
Bertha Dochouse Curzon Bloomsbury, London
Monday 24 June 2024
Phoenix Leicester
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
Thursday 30 May 2024
Queens Film Theatre Belfast
plus Q&A with Director Esther Johnson
Thursday 23 May, Friday 31 May, Friday 21 June 2024
National Media Museum (Alhambra Studio) Bradford