A Crack in the Mountain
A natural wonder, discovered in Vietnam in 1991, is the subject of Alastair Evans’s disappointing documentary.
I am surprised that this documentary has won awards because it strikes me as a prime example of a film having interesting subject matter but failing to present it as effectively as it should. The film is an ambitious debut for Alastair Evans since he is credited as director, producer, writer and editor while in addition making a major contribution to the photography. In line with its title A Crack in the Mountain is promoted as being concerned with Son Doong, the cave in Vietnam’s Phong Nha-kè Bàng National Park which is said to be the largest in the world. The park itself is a UNESCO world heritage site and the cave, first explored in 2009, has become a tourist attraction. Now, however, there is much concern over plans to build a cable car to make it more accessible to visitors (numbers are currently controlled). This would amount to a commercialisation of a place of rare beauty, one that could see the cable car entering the cave itself and thus drawing vast crowds which would be profitable but which would desecrate the site. Indeed, one of the principal contributors here is Huang Nguyen Thien Le co-founder of a campaign dedicated to saving Son Doong.
The prospect of a film on the subject is inviting but it does provide a challenge to the filmmaker in terms of structuring the material. One certainly finds images here taken both around and inside the cave which are truly awesome and which confirm the ability of Alastair Evans as a photographer. But even before the title comes up one is questioning his skills as a writer/director. The pre-credit sequence with its bits and pieces plays more like a trailer than an adequate introduction and the lack of a commentary is a disadvantage. Furthermore, the film starts with undated footage and is soon featuring a number of voice-over comments from people unidentified. Alas, this is a sign of things to come since there is no sense of sufficient consideration having been given as to how best to structure and shape the material.
This weakness is all the more obvious because, as the film proceeds, it touches on issues of wider concern too: hostility by the authorities to those protesting about the cable car plan leads to comments on the country’s control by the Communists with their restrictions on such freedoms, the limited land rights of the local people are referenced and what could happen to Son Doong is viewed as characteristic of exploitation worldwide by companies that are eager to develop for financial gain regardless of harm to the environment or damage to areas of natural beauty. In addition, Evans seeks to fit in an indication of the changing character of this poorest province of Vietnam over the past thirty years, taking in here both the advantages and disadvantages of its increasing attraction for tourists. With Covid restrictions having drastically reduced tourism, the film acknowledges the conflicting opinions among the locals as to whether or not the proposals to develop the appeal of Son Doong is now desirable or not.
The range of the material makes it all the more important that the various aspects should be fitted together to create a narrative flow. But that is exactly what is lacking. It is only after half an hour that we meet Huong Nguyen Thien Le and hear her commenting on how she became passionate over saving Son Doong but to have her explaining her concerns at the start would have made for a far stronger beginning than the scrappy mix that Evans has given us. In the middle stretches of his film, Son Doong itself drops out of sight entirely, while the references to state control even lead to the inclusion of a scene from the Halas and Batchelor animated film of George Orwell’s Animal Farm! Meanwhile brief comments about the cave made by visitors are dotted about here and there and more than once Evans falls back on speeded-up footage using it ultimately to accompany the message that in all probability the eventual fate of Son Doong is sealed.
By the time that it reaches its concluding scenes, A Crack in the Mountain has come to feel too repetitive, but the main complaint is the failure to find an effective way to thread the diverse material together so that it builds and coheres in a way that gives it satisfying narrative power. Nothing in the film is lacking in interest, but one can only regret that it has not been handled by a filmmaker with sufficient instinct and talent to shape it to best effect.
MANSEL STIMPSON
Featuring Huong Nguyen Thien Le, Adam Spillane, Howard Limbert, Giang Hoang Dang, Bill Hayton, Jonathan Drake, David English, Tuan Van Tran, Darryl Granger, Nguyen Bang Ho, Hai Thanh Nguyen, Jonathan Sims, Huy Tien Nguyen, Helen Adams, Bill Stone.
Dir Alastair Evans, Pro Alastair Evans, Screenplay Alastair Evans, Ph Alastair Evans and Ryan Deboodt, Ed Alastair Evans.
Marlovski Media-Dartmouth Films.
100 mins. Hong Kong. 2022. UK Rel: 26 May 2023. Cert. 12A.
