The Phans of Jersey City, 49 min., Steve Forman & Dennis Lanson, co-directors.
A documentary about a Vietnamese refugee family, appeared originally at New Directors/New Films at MOMA and on PBS stations (Available at http://www.der.org).
Co-filmmakers Steve Forman, Abbie Fink, John Fraker
Screen: 2 Documentaries on Families By Vincent Canby
Two quite unusual short films, "The Phans of Jersey City" (49 minutes), a documentary about the American exile of a Vietnamese family, and "Daughter Rite" (48 minutes), an intense examination of the relationship between a mother and daughter, will be shown at the Museum of Modern Art this evening at 8:30 in the New Directors/ New Films series, which is jointly sponsored by the museum and the Film Society of Lincoln Center. "The Phans of Jersey City," the work of Abbie H. Fink, Stephen L. Forman, John Fraker and Dennis Lanson, raises more questions about American political and social life than any one movie could conveniently answer, which is one of the reasons it is so effective. For a period of months the film makers virtually lived with the Phan family, 20 members of which, representing four generations, successfully escaped from Vietnam at the end of the war and arrived in this country in September 1975. Their Jersey City house is small, crowded and neat, and though it's apparent the Phans have come down in the world (in Vietnam Mr. Phan was a colonel in the army as well as a businessman who owned a 400-room hotel, among other properties), one suspects that the Americanization we see at work in Jersey City was well under way before the Phans left home. They didn't develop overnight their passion for appliances, for plastic slipcovers, for artificial flowers, for kewpie dolls with hoop skirts, and for automobiles, including one equipped with television, a CB radio, stereo and an eight-track tape deck. The Americanization of the Phans began a long time ago, which is what makes this picture of their exile, and of their dogged efforts to succeed in this country, so poignant. Two extremely pretty, articulate daughters, who are in their 20's, work in a shoe factory and talk animatedly about their efforts to better themselves. They have nothing against the other workers, they say, but these two Phans realize they're belong to a higher class. One son, a waiter in a diner, is the proud owner of that completely equipped sports car. Another son, abandoned by his Vietnamese wife (who ran off with the foreman of the Jersey factory where she worked), hangs around the house much of the time, pacing like a zoo animal. Mr. Phan, a small, wiry man, described as once having been the best tango dancer in Saigon, works cheerfully at whatever menial jobs he can find. The only member of the family to speak candidly about her unhappiness is the eldest daughter who, at 32, cooks and keeps house for the others and longs to get away from them. It would be a rare family that could stick together under such pressure. "The Phans of Jersey City" is a fascinating picture as well as another sorrowful postscript to the Vietnamese debacle.
