Tự Huy

January 1, 1940 – June 27, 2015

Hanoi, Vietnam

Tự Huy (c.1940 - 27th June 2015) was a Vietnamese director and actor. Born into a family of prominent Confucius scholars and direct descendants of the famed 19th-century poet Nguyễn Siêu, he first worked for the Vietnam Feature Film Studio as an actor, taking on small supporting roles in several landmark films of the revolutionary era, such as "On The Same River" (Chung Một Dòng Sông, 1959), "Fire Behind The Frontline" (Lửa Trung Tuyến, 1961), and "Ms. Tư Hậu" (Chị Tư Hậu, 1962). He also briefly worked for the Hanoi Theatre Troupe around this time, and best known as a main narrator. 1977 saw Tự Huy's transition to directing full-time. Through the collaboration with his wife, poet and novelist Đoàn Lê as the chief screenwriter, he directed several works, notably Day Of Return (Ngày Về, 1986), In Chase Of The Windy Devil Gang (Truy Lùng Băng Quỷ Gió, 1992), and The Fortune Seeker (Người Cầu May, 1990); the latter earned him a Best Director award at 1990 New Delhi Film Festival. His films of this era often fall into the neo-noir genre, with extensive use of high-contrast cinematography, stylistic sequences and naturalistic, poetry-influenced dialogues. Despite enjoying significant critical acclaim, the director was not popular commercially, and much of his scripts were not made into films due to lack of funding; as a result he moved to making documentaries in the late 1990s. Tự Huy passed away in 2015.