View source for Indochine (film)

{{short description|1992 film by Régis Wargnier}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2022}} 
{{Infobox film
| name           = Indochine
| image          = Indochine-movie-poster-1992-french.jpg
| caption        = French theatrical release poster
| director       = [[Régis Wargnier]]
| writer         = [[Érik Orsenna]]<br>[[Louis Gardel]]<br>Catherine Cohen<br>Régis Wargnier
| producer       = Eric Heumann<br>Jean Labadie
| starring       = [[Catherine Deneuve]]<br>[[Vincent Pérez]]<br>[[Linh Dan Pham]]<br>[[Jean Yanne]]
| music          = [[Patrick Doyle]] 
| cinematography = [[François Catonné]]
| editing        = Agnès Schwab<br>Geneviève Winding
| released       = {{film date|1992|4|15|df=y}}
| studio         = Paradis Films<br>[[BAC Films]]<br>Orly Films<br>Ciné Cinq
| distributor    = BAC Films
| country        = France
| language       = French<br>Vietnamese
| runtime        = 159 minutes
| gross          = $29.6 million<ref>{{cite web |title=Indochine (1992) – JPBox-Office |url=http://www.jpbox-office.com/fichfilm.php?id=4795}}</ref>
}}

'''''Indochine''''' ({{IPA|fr|ɛ̃dɔʃin}}) is a 1992 French [[period drama]] film set in colonial [[French Indochina]] from the 1930s to the 1950s. It is the story of Éliane Devries, a French plantation owner, and of her adopted [[Vietnamese people|Vietnamese]] daughter, Camille, set against the backdrop of the rising [[Vietnam]]ese nationalist movement. The screenplay was written by novelist [[Érik Orsenna]], screenwriters [[Louis Gardel]] and Catherine Cohen, and director [[Régis Wargnier]]. The film stars [[Catherine Deneuve]], [[Vincent Pérez]], [[Linh Dan Pham]], [[Jean Yanne]] and [[Dominique Blanc (actress)|Dominique Blanc]]. The film won the [[Academy Award for Best International Feature Film|Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film]] at the [[65th Academy Awards]], and Deneuve was nominated for [[Academy Award for Best Actress|Best Actress]].<ref name="Oscars1993"/>

==Plot==
In 1930, Éliane Devries, a woman born to French parents in colonial [[French Indochina|Indochina]], runs her and her widowed father's [[Rubber tree|rubber plantation]] with indentured laborers. She is the adoptive mother of Camille, a teenaged girl whose birth parents were friends of Éliane's and members of the [[Nguyễn dynasty]].

Éliane meets young [[French Navy]] lieutenant Jean-Baptiste Le Guen when they bid on the same painting at an [[auction]]. He challenges her publicly and, days later, turns up at her plantation searching for a boy whose [[sampan]] he set ablaze on suspicion of [[opium]] smuggling. Éliane and Jean-Baptiste begin an affair.

Camille meets Jean-Baptiste by chance when, one day, he rescues her from a prisoner escape attempt. She falls in love with him. After learning of this, Éliane uses her connections with high-ranking Navy officials to get Jean-Baptiste transferred to [[Haiphong]]. He confronts Éliane about this during a Christmas party, and in the ensuing argument, slaps her in front of his fellow officers. For this, he is sent to [[Hạ Long Bay|Dragon Islet]] (Hòn Rồng), a remote French military base in northern Indochina.

Éliane allows Camille to become engaged to Thanh, a pro-[[Communist Party of Vietnam|Communist]] Vietnamese boy expelled as a student from France because of his support for the 1930 [[Yên Bái mutiny]]. A sympathetic Thanh allows Camille to search for Jean-Baptiste up north. Traveling on foot, Camille reaches Dragon Islet and is imprisoned along with a Vietnamese family she travels with and other laborers. After seeing French officers torture and murder her traveling companions, she attacks an officer and shoots him in the struggle. Jean-Baptiste defies his superiors to protect Camille in the ensuing firefight, and the two flee.

After spending days adrift in the [[Gulf of Tonkin]], Camille and Jean-Baptiste reach land and are taken in by a Communist theater troupe, who offers them refuge in a secluded valley. Months later, Camille is pregnant with Jean-Baptiste's child, but they must vacate the valley out of safety. Thanh, now a high-ranking Communist operative, arranges for the troupe to smuggle the lovers into China.

Camille and Jean-Baptiste's story becomes a legend in [[tuồng]] performances by Vietnamese actors. When the couple nears the Chinese border, Jean-Baptiste takes his newborn son, Étienne, to [[baptize]] him in a river while Camille sleeps. After christening Étienne, Jean-Baptiste is ambushed by French soldiers. Camille evades capture and escapes with the troupe, while Jean-Baptiste is remanded to a [[Ho Chi Minh City|Saigon]] jail and Étienne is handed over to Éliane.

After days in prison, Jean-Baptiste agrees to talk if he can first see Étienne. The Navy, which has authority over the case, plans to court-martial Jean-Baptiste in [[Brest, France]] to avoid the public outcry that would arise from a trial in Indochina. Jean-Baptiste is allowed a 24-hour visitation with Étienne before being taken to France. He goes to see Éliane, who lets him stay with Étienne at her Saigon residence for the night.

The next day, Éliane finds Jean-Baptiste dead in his bed with a gunshot to his temple, a gun in hand, and an unharmed Étienne. Outraged, Éliane suspects that the police murdered him, but learns that the Communists may have done it to silence Jean-Baptiste. The death is eventually ruled a suicide. Camille is captured and sent to [[Côn Đảo Prison|Poulo-Condor]] – a high-security prison where visitors are not permitted. After five years, the [[Popular Front (France)|Popular Front]] comes to power and releases all political prisoners, including Camille. Éliane reunites with Camille, who declines to return to her mother and son, choosing instead to [[First Indochina War|fight for Vietnam's independence]] with the Communists. Taking Étienne with her, Éliane sells her plantation and leaves Indochina.

In 1954, Éliane and a grown Étienne visit [[Switzerland]], where Camille is a [[Communist Party of Vietnam|Vietnamese Communist Party]] delegate to the [[1954 Geneva Conference|Geneva Conference]]. Looking for Camille, Étienne goes to the negotiators' hotel, which is so crowded that he is not sure how she can find or recognize him. He tells Éliane that he sees her as his mother. The next day, French Indochina becomes independent from France and [[Partition of Vietnam|Vietnam is partitioned]] into [[North Vietnam|North]] and [[South Vietnam]].

==Cast==
{{castlist|
* [[Catherine Deneuve]] as Éliane Devries
* [[Vincent Pérez]] as Jean-Baptiste 
* [[Linh Dan Pham]] as Camille
* [[Jean Yanne]] as Guy 
* [[Dominique Blanc (actress)|Dominique Blanc]] as Yvette 
* Henri Marteau as Émile 
* [[Kieu Chinh]] as Mme. Minh Tam
* Eric Nguyen as Thanh
* Jean-Baptiste Huynh as Étienne
* Carlo Brandt as Castellani 
* [[Hubert Saint-Macary]] as Raymond 
* [[Andrzej Seweryn]] as Hébrard
* [[Thibault de Montalembert]] as Charles-Henri
* [[Như Quỳnh (actress)|Như Quỳnh]] as Sao
}}

==Production==
The film was shot mainly in [[Imperial City, Hue]], Ha Long ([[Ha Long Bay]]) and [[Ninh Binh]] ([[Phát Diệm Cathedral]]) in Vietnam.<ref>{{cite web |last=Ng |first=Josee |date=2021-10-01 |title=Indochine (1992): A Historical Movie About Vietnam That Won an Oscar |url=https://thesmartlocal.com/vietnam/indochine-1992/ |access-date=2022-04-13 |website=TheSmartLocal Vietnam}}</ref> [[Butterworth, Penang|Butterworth]] in Malaysia was used as a substitute for [[Ho Chi Minh City|Saigon]], and Éliane Devries' "Lang-Sai" plantation house was actually [[Crag Hotel]] in Penang, Malaysia.<ref>{{cite web |title=Borneo Expat Writer |url=http://borneoexpatwriter.blogspot.com/2009/11/tropical-affairs-indochine-christmas.html |date=19 November 2009}}{{Better source needed|reason=Current reference is a personal blog.|date=January 2025}}</ref> Some parts were filmed in [[Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion]], in George Town, Penang.<ref>{{cite web |date=31 July 2003 |title=Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion |url=http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/hotels-cheong-article-082003 |website=[[Architectural Digest]]}}</ref> Principal photography began on 8 April 1991 and concluded on 22 August 1991.{{Citation needed|date=January 2025}}

==Release==

===Box office===
The film received a total of 3,198,663 cinema-goers in France, making it the 6th most attended film of the year.<ref>{{cite web |title=Indochine (1992) – JPBox-Office |url=http://www.jpbox-office.com/fichfilm.php?id=4795&view=2}}</ref> The film also grossed $5,603,158 in North America.<ref>{{cite web |title=Indochine |url=https://www.boxofficemojo.com/release/rl2287699457/ |website=Box Office Mojo}}</ref>

===Critical reception===
On [[review aggregator]] website [[Rotten Tomatoes]], ''Indochine'' holds an approval rating of 75%, based on 20 reviews, and an average rating of 6.4/10.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Indochine |url=https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/indochine |access-date=11 January 2023 |publisher=[[Rotten Tomatoes]]}}</ref>

Critics' reviews praised the film's photography and scenery, while citing issues with the plot and character development. [[Roger Ebert]] wrote the film "intends to be the French '<nowiki/>''[[Gone with the Wind (film)|Gone with the Wind]]'',' a story of romance and separation, told against the backdrop of a ruinous war". He continued "'''Indochine''<nowiki/>' is an ambitious, gorgeous missed opportunity – too slow, too long, too composed. It is not a successful film, and yet there is so much good in it that perhaps it's worth seeing anyway…The beauty, the photography, the impact of the scenes shot on location in Vietnam, are all striking.“<ref>{{Cite web |last=Ebert |first=Roger |date=5 February 1993 |title=Indochine movie review |url=https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/indochine-1993 |access-date=13 April 2022 |website=[[Rogerebert.com]] |language=en}}</ref>

Rita Kempley of ''[[The Washington Post]]'' found the transformation of Camille from a naive, pampered innocent to Communist revolutionary to be a compelling plot line, but noted, "The trouble is we never see the fragile teenager undergo this surprising metamorphosis. Director [[Régis Wargnier|Regis Wargnier]] seems far more interested in what the white folks are doing back on the plantation". She commented further, "Wargnier, who learned his craft at the elbow of [[Claude Chabrol]], does expose the geographic splendors of Southeast Asia as well as the common sense of its people, whose sly observations lend '''Indochine''<nowiki/>' both energy and levity".<ref>{{Cite news |last=Kempley |first=Rita |date=5 February 1993 |title=Indochine |newspaper=[[The Washington Post]] |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/videos/indochinepg13kempley_a0a35d.htm |access-date=13 April 2022}}</ref>

Of the film's metaphorical mother-daughter relationship between Éliane and her adopted Vietnamese daughter Camille, Nick Davis said “''Indochine''<nowiki/>'s allegorical intentions actually play much better than the specific dramas enacted among its characters", adding "While Eliane-as-Establishment, Jean-Baptiste-as-Rebellious-Lower-Class-Youth, and Camille-as-Uneasy Cultural Mixture seem to follow the historical pattern of France's relationship with Indochina, their interactions only make sense to the extent they are interpreted as solely symbolic figures".<ref>{{Cite web |last=Davis |first=Nick |title=Indochine |url=http://www.nicksflickpicks.com/indochin.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20010228074510/http://www.nicksflickpicks.com/indochin.html |archive-date=28 February 2001 |access-date=13 April 2022 |website=Nick’s Flick Picks}}</ref>

===Accolades===
{| class="wikitable plainrowheaders"
|-
! Award
! Category
! Nominee(s)
! Result
|-
| 20/20 Awards
| colspan="2"| Best Foreign Language Film
| {{nom}}
|-
| rowspan="2"| [[65th Academy Awards|Academy Awards]]<ref name="Oscars1993">{{Cite news|url=http://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1993 |title=The 65th Academy Awards (1993) Nominees and Winners |access-date=22 October 2011 |publisher=Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141109220926/http://www.oscars.org/oscars/ceremonies/1993 |archive-date=9 November 2014}}</ref>
| colspan="2"| [[Academy Award for Best International Feature Film|Best Foreign Language Film]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[Academy Award for Best Actress|Best Actress]]
| rowspan="2"| [[Catherine Deneuve]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| Awards Circuit Community Awards
| Best Actress in a Leading Role
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[47th British Academy Film Awards|British Academy Film Awards]]<ref>{{cite web |url=http://awards.bafta.org/award/1994/film |title=BAFTA Awards: Film in 1994 |website=[[BAFTA]] |year=1994 |access-date=16 September 2016 |ref={{harvid|BAFTA|1994}}}}</ref>
| [[BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language|Best Film Not in the English Language]]
| Eric Heumann and [[Régis Wargnier]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| rowspan="12"| [[18th César Awards|César Awards]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.academie-cinema.org/evenements/ceremonie-des-cesar-1993/ |title=The 1993 Caesars Ceremony |publisher=[[César Awards]] |access-date=July 5, 2021}}</ref>
| [[César Award for Best Film|Best Film]]
| rowspan="2"| Régis Wargnier
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Director|Best Director]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Actress|Best Actress]]
| Catherine Deneuve
| {{won}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Supporting Actor|Best Supporting Actor]]
| [[Jean Yanne]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Supporting Actress|Best Supporting Actress]]
| [[Dominique Blanc (actress)|Dominique Blanc]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[César Award for Most Promising Actress|Most Promising Actress]]
| [[Linh Dan Pham]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Cinematography|Best Cinematography]]
| [[François Catonné]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Costume Design|Best Costume Design]]
| Pierre-Yves Gayraud and [[Gabriella Pescucci]]
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Editing|Best Editing]]
| Geneviève Winding
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Original Music|Best Original Music]]
| [[Patrick Doyle]] 
| {{nom}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Production Design|Best Production Design]]
| Jacques Bufnoir
| {{won}}
|-
| [[César Award for Best Sound|Best Sound]]
| Dominique Hennequin and Guillaume Sciama
| {{won}}
|-
| [[Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association|Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association Awards]]
| colspan="2"| Best Foreign Language Film
| {{won}}
|-
| [[50th Golden Globe Awards|Golden Globe Awards]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.goldenglobes.com/film/indochine |title=Indochine – Golden Globes |website=[[HFPA]] |access-date=July 5, 2021 |ref={{harvid|HFPA|1993}}}}</ref>
| colspan="2"| [[Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film|Best Foreign Language Film]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[7th Goya Awards|Goya Awards]]
| colspan="2"| [[Goya Award for Best European Film|Best European Film]]
| {{won}}
|-
| rowspan="2"| [[National Board of Review Awards 1992|National Board of Review Awards]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://nationalboardofreview.org/award-years/1992/ |title=1992 Award Winners |website=[[National Board of Review]] |access-date=July 5, 2021}}</ref>
| colspan="2"| [[National Board of Review: Top Five Foreign Language Films|Top Five Foreign Language Films]]
| {{won}}
|-
| colspan="2"| [[National Board of Review Award for Best Foreign Language Film|Best Foreign Language Film]]
| {{won}}
|-
| [[1992 New York Film Critics Circle Awards|New York Film Critics Circle Awards]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.nyfcc.com/awards/?awardyear=1992 |title=1992 New York Film Critics Circle Awards |website=[[New York Film Critics Circle]] |access-date=July 5, 2021}}</ref>
| colspan="2"| [[New York Film Critics Circle Award for Best Foreign Language Film|Best Foreign Language Film]]
| {{draw|3rd Place}}
|-
| rowspan="2"| Political Film Society Awards
| colspan="2"| [[Political Film Society Award for Democracy|Democracy]]
| {{won}}
|-
| colspan="2"| [[Political Film Society Award for Human Rights|Human Rights]]
| {{nom}}
|}

* The film was selected for screening as part of the Cannes Classics section at the [[2016 Cannes Film Festival]].<ref name="Classics">{{cite web |url=http://www.festival-cannes.fr/en/article/62136.html |title=Cannes Classics 2016 |access-date=21 April 2016 |date=20 April 2016 |work=Cannes Film Festival |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170210012746/http://www.festival-cannes.fr/en/article/62136.html |archive-date=10 February 2017 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

==See also==
* [[List of submissions to the 65th Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film]]
* [[List of French submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* {{IMDb title|0104507|Indochine}}
* {{tcmdb title|id=79213}}
* {{Mojo title|indochine|Indochine}}
* {{rotten-tomatoes|indochine|Indochine}}

{{Régis Wargnier}}
{{Navboxes
|title = Awards for ''Indochine''
|list =
{{AcademyAwardBestForeignLanguageFilm 1981–2000}}
{{Dallas–Fort Worth Film Critics Association Award for Best Foreign Language Film}}
{{Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film 1990–2009}}
{{Goya Award for Best European Film}}
{{National Board of Review Award for Best Foreign Language Film}}
}}
{{French submission for Academy Awards}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Indochine}}
[[Category:1992 films]]
[[Category:1990s historical romance films]]
[[Category:1992 romantic drama films]]
[[Category:1990s French films]]
[[Category:1990s French-language films]]
[[Category:French historical drama films]]
[[Category:French historical romance films]]
[[Category:French romantic drama films]]
[[Category:1990s Vietnamese-language films]]
[[Category:First Indochina War films]]
[[Category:Films about interracial romance]]
[[Category:Films directed by Régis Wargnier]]
[[Category:Sony Pictures Classics films]]
[[Category:Best International Feature Film Academy Award winners]]
[[Category:Best Foreign Language Film Golden Globe winners]]
[[Category:Films featuring a Best Actress César Award–winning performance]]
[[Category:Films featuring a Best Supporting Actress César Award–winning performance]]
[[Category:Films set in the 1930s]]
[[Category:Films set in the 1950s]]
[[Category:Films set in French Indochina]]
[[Category:Films shot in Vietnam]]
[[Category:Films shot in Malaysia]]
[[Category:Films scored by Patrick Doyle]]
[[Category:Films whose cinematographer won the Best Cinematography César Award]]
[[Category:BAC Films films]]
[[Category:French-language historical drama films]]