Letters from Vietnam / Listy z Wietnamu (1956) dir. Helena Lemanska

In 1955, the team of the Polish Film Chronicle documented life in communist Vietnam for almost half a year. There was an opportunity to do so, as Poles were a part of the international commission supervising the implementation of the Geneva provisions. From January to June 1955, the Polish Film Chronicle crew visited the Vietnamese Democratic Republic with cameras. As a result of the decisions of the Geneva Conference in 1954, Vietnam was divided along the 17th parallel into communist North Vietnam and anti-communist South Vietnam. The implementation of the Geneva provisions and mediation between the Vietnamese and the French were supervised by an international commission which consisted of Canadians Indians and Poles. The report from Vietnam was made in the form of ‘letters’ from various places in this exotic country. The operators captured large cities (Hanoi and Saigon) and the provinces (reconstruction of the railway line, transport of raw materials, work on irrigation of rice fields). Some places, such as Phu Tho, which were completely destroyed during the war with the French, are beginning to be teeming with life again. The ethnic group was provided with a separate Tai-Meo administrative zone. On their way, the crew of the Polish Film Chronicle met their colleagues - cameramen from traveling cinema, but Vietnamese cinematographers travel on foot with equipment and food supplies. The cinema offers a documentary about the reconstruction of Warsaw and a Chinese film. Helena Lemańska, the director of the film, shot Listy... in cooperation with an experienced cameraman, Władysław Forbert. In the years 1950-1967 she was the editor-in-chief of the Polish Film Chronicle. Her documentary output, apart from chronicles, was entirely devoted to Vietnam: “Bambus mój brat“ (1955), “Rozprawa“ (1955), ’“Anghor“ (1956), “Uwaga, uwaga, nadchodzi“ (1966), “List z Polski“ (1968). She has also shot “Dwa dni w Pekinie“ (1966), a documentary about China.