The story of Vietnamese engineers and technicians joining hands to change lives in a remote area of Africa has inspired Discovery Channel filmmakers to make a documentary featuring the hard work of the Vietnamese team and showing the impact they had on local people.

Filmmakers for Discovery Channel on a shoot in Africa. (Photos courtesy of Ha Thuc Van)

The 24-minute film will air in December on Discovery Asia Pacific and Discovery Africa.

The film crew arrived in Vietnam on September 26 to shoot the film’s final scenes. They are scheduled to stay for one week.

Ha Thuc Van, director of the Red Bridge Company and the production director of the film’s shoot in Vietnam, told Viet Nam News, the English-language newspaper of Vietnam News Agency, that the title of the documentary is “Connecting Dreams.”

The film is about Vietnamese people bringing modern technologies to poor countries with the aim of improving the lives of local people.

It also shows the lives of the Maasai people in Kenya and the Nilotic ethnic group in northern Tanzania.

Their lives have changed thanks to the military industry and telecoms group Viettel, which overcame huge difficulties to bring advanced technologies to underdeveloped areas.

The documentary started filming in late 2017 and has finished shooting in Africa.

The film crew has visited Vietnam multiple times already to film in Ca Mau and Hai Phong. Now, they return for a shoot in Hanoi that will end the documentary.

The seven-member crew includes the Vietnamese-American host of the documentary, Jordan Nguyen. Creative director Vikram Channa, producers Emile Guertin and Ira Tufile and other production staffers also made the trip.

Channa came to Vietnam in 2009 and 2010 to produce a series of documentaries for Discovery including “Mr Long’s Traveling Cinema,” “Jam Buster,” “Digging up the Dead” and “Thousand-year-old City”.

“Channa’s four films tell four unique stories about Vietnam’s culture and society in the context of integration and urbanisation,” Van said.

“The story of Vietnamese technicians working in Africa moved us,” said Van. “You can’t imagine the hard conditions and severe weather they suffered. They did extraordinary work. Audiences will see how technology changed the lives of locals.”

Van said that the return of Discovery Channel indicates Vietnam’s successful integration with the world. She said the documentary would introduce more than 600 million viewers to the strength and compassion of the Vietnamese people.

“It is an opportunity to popularise Vietnam and its people without any cost.”

Van praised the careful approach of Discover Channel’s filmmakers and content writers. “They want to feature ‘Connecting Dreams’ because they like the story and think it can inspire others.”

VNF/VNA