Love, Dad

Diana Cam Van Nguyen / Czech Republic, Slovakia / 2021 / Czech Premiere / 12 min.

synopsis

Writing letters as a form of therapy and trying to cope with feeling misunderstood and abandoned is the central theme of this autobiographical graduate film. An adult Diana goes through the letters her father wrote her from prison when she was little. The warmth and lovingness of her father's words contradict his behavior when he returns home, which the artist is now trying to understand so she can re-establish her relationship with her estranged parent. Her unusual technique of combining live-action film with rotoscoping, 2-D, and cut-out animation creates an aesthetic space for authentic confession where the burning question echos: “Would everything be alright if I were born a boy?”

biography

Diana Cam Van Nguyen (1993) studies at the Department of Animation at FAMU. To date, she has received a number of nominations and awards for her work: her short film The Little One (2017) was part of the ECFA DocAward selection at the Berlinale, while her film Apart (2018) earned an award at the Ji.hlava IDFF and a nomination for Best Student Film at the Czech Lion Awards.