Three Seasons - Region 0 DVD

Three Seasons tells three tangentially linked stories. First is the tale of Kien An (Ngoc Hiep Nguyen), a lovely young woman who works picking lotus blossoms at a sanitarium. She becomes a scribe for its mysterious proprietor, Teacher Dao (Manh Cuong Tran), a leper who hides himself away in shame but whose soul is full of beautiful poetry. Then there is Hai (Don Duong), a gentle "cyclo" (bicycle ricksha) driver who falls in love with Lan (Zoe Bui), an alluring, feisty prostitute he sees coming and going from the big tourist hotels. Last, there is James Hager (Keitel), an ex-Marine who fought in the war and has returned to find the daughter he fathered many years before. There is also a charming plot about Woody (Huu Duoc Nguyen), a little street urchin who sells contraband out of a suitcase. The narrative involving Keitel's character is the least developed in the film, and seems to be almost an afterthought, but in any event, truly magnificent visuals and a delicate lyricism make Three Seasons a haunting, bittersweet film portrait of life in contemporary Vietnam. --Laura Mirsky