Vietnam (miniseries)
| Vietnam | |
|---|---|
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|
| Genre | mini-series |
| Written by |
Chris Noonan Terry Hayes John Duigan |
| Directed by |
Chris Noonan John Duigan |
| Starring |
Barry Otto Nicole Kidman Nicholas Eadie |
| Composer(s) | William Motzing |
| Country of origin | Australia |
| Original language(s) | English Vietnamese |
| No. of episodes | 5 |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) |
Terry Hayes George Miller Doug Mitchell |
| Running time | 437 min |
| Release | |
| Original network | Network Ten |
| Original release | 23 February – 27 April 1987 |
Vietnam is a (1987) Australian TV mini-series, directed by Chris Noonan and John Duigan. It stars Barry Otto, Nicole Kidman and Nicholas Eadie. The series won the Logie Award for Most Popular Single Telemovie or Miniseries.
Set in the 1960s through to the early 1970s, Vietnam is a mini-series about Australia's involvement in the Vietnam war. The Goddard family live in Canberra - Public servant Douglas (Barry Otto), Evelyn (Veronica Lang) and their son Phil (Nicholas Eadie) and daughter Megan (Nicole Kidman). Aged 15, Megan is now a rebellious teenager, infuriating her conservative parents whilst her older sibling Phil is a budding photographer.
Australia joins the war in Vietnam and the strains and stresses it places on the Goddard family mirror the political and social upheavals the country experiences in the 1960s. Phil is called up in the national draft and he reluctantly goes to do his duty with Australian army forces in Vietnam. He encounters the harsh realities of the war and he is horrified as his unit is ordered to forcibly evacuate and destroy a peasant village. Phil and his best mate Laurie (Mark Lee)become romantically involved with Vietnamese sisters Lien (Pauline Chan) and Le (Grace Parr). Back home, Douglas' workaholic lifestyle is straining his marriage and both parents are growing distant from their increasingly headstrong daughter Megan. The latter begins a relationship with an older boy Serge (John Polson) and she has to, at first, pretend to be a fellow university student to become involved with him. Serge goes away to University in Sydney and Megan later runs away from home to join him. Phil comes home on leave but the traumatic experiences of the war weigh heavily on him and he can no-longer adjust to normal life.
Phil and Laurie return to the war which is growing ever more bloodier and cruel. Le is gang-raped by a squad of US soldiers who have been brutalised by their experiences of combat. The youngest American soldier is left behind to execute her but he cannot bring himself to do it, instead he cuts off one of her ears and fires a shot into the dirt, in order to convince his comrades that he had killed the woman and taken a 'souvenir'. Outraged by the sufferings of her people, Lien joins the Viet Minh. During the Tet Offensive, her group ambushes an Australian truck, wiping out the occupants including Laurie who is left permanently disabled by his injuries. Phil, increasingly dis-illusioned with the conduct of the war, enlists in a renegade special forces unit. After taking part in an ambush of a group of guerrillas Phil is horrified to discover that one of the dead is Lien. Unbalanced by his discovery he later endangers his fellow soldiers with a grenade during target practice and is thrown out of the unit as a result.
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