The title says more than we initially imagine. I have heard that Mel Gibson wants to make a movie about vikings, their brutality. There may be no need to look that far into the past when evil ripped apart a nation only 35 years ago.

There was a time when popular pressures were forcing an end to American participation in the Vietnam War. Flower children believed they were right. It was a massive political issue in the USA. The problem in Vietnam spawned many very successful motion pictures, mostly about American involvement and the difficulties of fighting conventional war against gorilla warfare tactics. This is a story about what happened to Vietnamese people after the American "support" left.

My hat is off to the film makers of this motion picture. This is a picture that defines the boundaries of what it is to be human. I am fortunate to have watched it. Hope floats.

A moving portrait, in two acts, of a family torn apart by war. Journey from the Fall tells the story of a family forced apart by the circumstances of the Vietnam War. The father a former south Vietnamese soldier refuses to leave with the rest of his family at the fall of Saigon. His wife, mother and son escape to America through a harrowing journey as one of the Vietnamese boat people and after some time set up a new life there. Meanwhile the father is captured by the North Vietnamese and placed into a forced labour "reeducation" camp. In many ways there is little here that is really new, the suffering and inhuman treatment in the forced labour camps and the contrast to a new life in America has been told before in other films, though not necessarily about the same war or era, but Journey from the Fall manages to pull it off in a particularly poignant way. This is not an easy film to watch, you will likely find yourself genuinely moved to tears. It does however unfortunately overstep the bounds from moving drama into overt sentimentality a little too often. A few too many blurry childhood videos, coincidental meetings, and "sad music" all in the name of pathos. Thankfully the acting, directing and cinematography are all top notch so much of this, though not all, can be overlooked.

I mentioned that this is a story told in two acts and here is another place where Journey from the Fall falters a bit. Though interleaved somewhat we basically have act one telling the story of the father suffering in the camps back in Vietnam and act two telling the story of his family trying to make it in America. Though both stories are extremely effective we have a bit of an issue with the pacing of the two. Perhaps it would have been better if the two had been interleaved even more so that the two were told in parallel throughout from beginning to end. As it stands the first act is relatively fast paced and harrowing and stands in stark contrast to the second acts slow and steady pace. Both have their place and it works natively and emotionally, the wounds that are inflicted in the first act both figuratively and emotionally take their time to heal during the second act. However the contrast does make one feel like one is watching two separate films at times.

These issues aside this is still a very effective, moving, film and one well worth the watch if nothing else just to see the story of the war told from a different far too neglected point of view.

The movie was good and worth watching even with subtitles. It is very depressing, but that due to the subject, that's expected. Even though the it is a story, it had the feeling of being authentic as though watching a documentary. I would recommend to those that want to get the feeling of hardship that those of the time had to go through and quite possible still go through in other parts of the world. It's a universal story of hardships endured through times of war and misplacement during conflict. The movie is a dark movie where there is a constant suffering of the characters until almost the end of the movie. Some parts could have probably gone into more detail about the ideologies of the people, but I would still recommend it.