At a press briefing in Hanoi on May 11, Lai Van Sinh, Head of the Cinematography Department announced that 16 of the latest films from 15 countries will be featured at the festival. Each film will be shown twice a day, once in its original language and once with Vietnamese subtitles.

The festival is just one of several events that are being held to mark the 9th Asia-Europe Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, which will convene in Hanoi from May 25-26. The meeting will focus on enhancing the Asian-European partnership to cope with the global financial crisis, amongst other global challenges.

“Don’t Burn” is based on ‘Nhat Ky Dang Thuy Tram’ (Dang Thuy Tram’s Diary) and opens with scenes of fighting in Quang Ngai Province’s Duc Pho District, where Tram worked and died in 1970 after a US army attack.

But the director says he had no intention of turning ‘Nhat Ky Dang Thuy Tram’ into a war movie. It is simply to remind people of the need to love others and to cherish every moment in life.

After Thuy Tram’s last battle, American soldier Fred Whitehurst came across her two diaries, which haunted him for the next 35 years until he returned them to her family three years ago.