For most Americans contact with Vietnamese immigrants is generally limited to pho soup, Vietnamese restaurants, Vietnamese manicurists, or shopping in one of the "Little Saigon" communities that have sprung up in large metropolitan areas (the most famous being Westminister, just south of LA). There's certainly a lot more history lying behind Vietnamese Americans than is generally known, but this parallels Howard Zinn's brand of history, told from the vanquished point of view.

Working at a small business owned and operated by a Vietnamese family has afforded me more than the usual contact with this unique population of legal immigrants—and some have alluded to nearly unbelievable scenarios about how their family came to the U.S. after the Communist take-over. Most Americans block out this period, but Vietnamese immigrants have personal narratives that rival the most intense Hitchcock thriller. None that I know wanted to dwell on these horror stories, preferring to focus on their positive opportunities in the U.S.—at least when speaking in English.

Filmmaker Ham Tran has now made this unrecorded history viscerally accessible in Journey From the Fall, based on his research about communist re-education camps and the Vietnamese boat people following the fall of Saigon. As Tran relates on the film's official website, "... the world does not know about the communist re-education camps and Vietnamese boat people because they’ve never seen images of them before."

From numerous accounts, Tran has formulated a composite chronicle of one family's struggle for freedom. Symbolically framing his narrative around the legend of revolutionary king Le Loi and the return of the sword through the Golden Turtle God, Tran expresses the hopes and dreams of traditional Vietnamese people. The story is told to young Lai (Nguyen Thai Nguyen) by his grandmother Ba Noi (Kieu Chinh).

Two decades of civil war abruptly end on April 30, 1975 when the U.S. pulls out. Americans will recall those images of desperate Vietnamese attempting to board the last huey from the embassy roof, but this only marks the beginning of a mass exodus. Despite his loyalty to the defunct South Vietnamese government, Long Nguyen (Long Nguyen) decides to remain. When imprisoned in a Communist re-education camp, he insists that his family escape without him. His wife Mai (Diem Lien), son, and grandmother undertake the harrowing journey to eventually re-settle in southern California.

The narrative switches back and forth between the family's dangerous exodus and Long's tortuous imprisonment that rivals the Holocaust. Long fears his family has perished like many refugees, but he regains hope when photos and a letter from his son are smuggled to him. He swears to escape and rejoin his family.

Although the narrative borders on sentimentality, its heartfelt truthfulness can not be ignored. The intense familial bonds and connection to the native land are evident and very real. Thoroughly compelling and emotionally draining, the plot gains even more authenticity from the film's strong Vietnamese ensemble cast, whose principal characters all have a personal connection to the subject matter. Especially memorable is Long Nguyen, who has won "best actor" awards in a couple of film festivals, but that is likely due to his more isolated and "sexier" scripted part than superiority to the rest of the ensemble. Originally cast in other roles, he landed the lead part because he was the skinniest actor and could look more emaciated in the prison camp scenes.

Journey From the Fall couldn't come at a more timely period, given the current anti-immigrant sentiment in the U.S. After following these characters for 90 minutes, we are placed in the grandmother's shoes when she meets an Orange county elementary school principal about a minor altercation. His ignorance about their plight is darkly exposed when he attempts to compare his ancestor's Irish roots and adjustment to America. We've experienced their hardships and sense their soul-wrenching losses. Thankfully, the U.S. generally was in a more generous mood towards Vietnamese immigrants at that time. Tran's noteworthy film provides unforgettable human faces that bring greater awareness about this under reported history.