Echoes Of The Phoenix
A journey full of bitterness and fated encounters of a Cai Luong performer who decides to return to the stage after an incident that stops her from singing.
Genre: Drama, Musical​
​Language: Vietnamese
​Subtitle: English
![[TRAILER] Echoes of The Phoenix Short Film](https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/1948166223-5758448781111b6edea0370b4e3decc902e37052a422456accea02cef9b13e40-d_1920x1080?&r=pad)
​In this project, I am...
Director
Music Producer
Assistant
Editor
Sound Designer
Composer
Stills
​About the project
Echoes Of The Phoenix is my 2nd film as a director, and it was produced as my final project for Digital Film & Video program in RMIT University Vietnam. The film is one of the most personal works I’ve ever created. It felt true to myself—crafted with heart, meaning, and deep relatability. Through this film, I also embraced and honored the beauty of Vietnamese cultural heritage, weaving it into a story that resonates beyond time.
In 2016, I was a young and ambitious basketball player, promised an irresistible path to glory: playing as a point guard for the city team, winning finals, going international, being the hotshot. But that dream almost became a reality—until it was stolen from me. During an important game, a bad landing sent my left ankle off its usual orbit, leaving me crippled for months. Soon after, I was replaced and completely removed from the equation. No team wanted a player with an injury history, no matter how well I recovered. Ultimately, it became a traumatic experience that kept me from stepping back on the court or ever enjoying the sport again.
Carrying this personal experience into the years that followed, I always wanted to create a film that could capture the feeling of being stripped of a purpose and the journey to finding peace with it. However, I struggled to find a visual concept that could poetically represent my profound passion for basketball while also resonating with a wide audience. Then, I discovered the beautiful world of Cai Luong (Vietnamese opera), an art form rich with emotional depth and fueled by some of the most passionate followers I had ever seen. I realized that audiences would instinctively understand the kind of glory these Cai Luong artists experience—and how incredibly painful it must be to lose—because they pour every ounce of their soul into their craft to make it come alive.
It was a beautiful coincidence that I chose Cai Luong as the heart of the story. It allowed me to create a character capable of portraying the loss of passion while also infusing the film with its musical power—one that transcends the cinematic experience.
Technical wise, since Echoes of the Phoenix was realized within the musical genre, equal focus was placed on both visuals and music during pre-production. We wrote the songs in parallel with the picture, ensuring they complemented each other seamlessly. As both a musician and a filmmaker, the integration of audio and visuals came instinctively to me. However, the amount of preparation required was, at times, nearly unmanageable. I had to start from scratch in understanding Cải LÆ°Æ¡ng, assemble and collaborate with musicians to compose the songs, record and engineer the music—all while maintaining the authenticity of the story and the film’s visual language. Producing this movie was one of the biggest learning experiences of my life.
Echoes of the Phoenix had an educational screening at RMIT University, where it was praised for its heartfelt storytelling and its role in promoting one of Vietnam's most important intangible cultural assets. The film is currently in its festival run, and its public release date is yet to be determined.
