Director: Dang Nhat Minh
Duyen's undying love for her husband who had lost his life while in the military during the Vietnamese War has brought out the different percepts of the Vietnamese culture of duty and sacrifice. However, this had drove her to insanity where her plan to hide the fact that her husband is dead from her family affects herself too. As she receives fake letters from her husband every now and then, she slowly believed that he is still alive. Dang Nhat Minh did not specifically distinguish who were ghosts or the living in scenes where it was ambiguous. It was only known where there was mention of her husband or when she really sees him. At one point of the film, the hallucinations were so real to Duyen that the director tried to bring it across to the audience by having a usual marketplace where the ghosts looked 'touchable'. His style is very different from usual horror films, where normally the ghosts were translucent and full of vengeance.
In the scene where she finally meets her husband in her hallucination, she wants to hold Nam's hand, but as they look at each other, their hands were in a position as though they were holding hands, but they do not touch. Through this way, the audience can understand that although her late husband looked so real to her, there is still an absence of the element of touch.
Duyen: Do you have something to tell me?
Why are you silent?
Have I done something wrong?
Then why do you look so sad?
Nam: I want those still living to have happiness.
Duyen: Happiness?
Nam: Only living people can bring happiness to each other.
I've completed my role in the living world.
Duyen: No. You're still with me, I still feel you near me everyday.
Nam: What remains of me is something intangible.
I felt that even though she's in a state of denial in such a way that she starts to have hallucinations of her husband, that particular scene is her own hallucination but Nam said "what remains of me is something intangible", deep down inside she knows that her husband is dead.
In a surprisingly good way, Khang had fell in love with Duyen in the process of writing fake letters from her husband for her. Is it probably because he really assumed the role of her husband that he could find the feelings for her? That as he thinks slowly of Duyen everytime he writes a fake letter, his own heart follows its way to her?
I couldn't imagine how many widows in Vietnam have suffered as their husbands, fathers and family members sacrificed themselves for the war that lasted for almost 20 years. Dang Nhat Minh's interpretation and version may not be the worst one.
[1] Bao Giò Cho Đến Tháng Mười (When the Tenth Month Comes). Retrieved on 28 April 2011 from http://forgottenclassicsofyesteryear.blogspot.com/2009/12/bao-gio-cho-en-thang-muoi-when-tenth.html
[2] Bard in China Presents “Vietnamese Cinema: Past, Present, and Future,” Two Evenings of Film and Discussion, February 4-5. Retrieved on 28 April from http://www.bard.edu/news/releases/pr/fstory.php?id=1390
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