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The National Cinema Center’s website has become overloaded because of an unexpected surge in bookings for “Dao, Pho Va Piano”. 

Meanwhile, on cinema forums, the movie has become a hot topic of discussion. The movie has won praise from all critics and audiences, and surprised everyone because of its high quality.

The success of ‘Dao, Pho Va Piano’ has surprised people because it is a state-funded movie made with limited budget, and a film with historical theme, featuring heroic moments of the 60-day Battle of Hanoi, when Hanoians fought to defend their capital city, a difficult theme for film makers. 

It hit the screen very quietly, because no money has been spent for media campaigns. It has become famous and is in no way inferior to ‘Mai’, a privately invested film with huge budget and screened at the same time.

‘Dao, Pho va Piano’ is one of two films made with money from the 2023 state budget of VND20 billion. 

No one expected the movie to become a phenomenon, because the state didn’t allocate any budget for advertisements and distribution. Only audiences who came to the National Cinema Center during Tet or logged in the center’s official website got information about the screening, which began on the first day of the New Lunar Year of the Dragon.

‘Dao, Pho va Piano’ is a special film because it is exclusively screened at the National Cinema Center in Hanoi, and the total revenue of the film will be returned to the state budget.

As the film has become famous, the number of screenings is limited and finding tickets is difficult. The National Cinema Center’s website crashed because of ticket requests and the situation did not improve until noon on February 20.

Sources said that tickets for the screenings on February 20 had run out several days before and the National Cinema Center is reducing the number of screenings of other films to give room to ‘Dao, Pho va Piano’.

According to Box Office Vietnam, as of the morning of February 20, 2024, revenue had reached VND500 million, an impressive figure for a state-funded film screened at only one cinema. 

With 16 screenings for the day and 3,300 tickets sold, the rate of ‘Dao, Pho va Piano’ may even exceed that of “Mai’. 

Analysts said the movie caught special attention because it has high quality. Trinh Thanh Nha, the scriptwriter, commented that this is a "nice, beautiful and fast-paced film and it has won the heart of young people".

They noted that ‘Dao, Pho va Piano’ was not created with a slow pace. There is no sensational detail in the film, but it still can attract audiences with unpredictable happenings.

Nha said that Feature Film Joint Stock Company 1 has not made any profit making the movie.

Nha said that with the limited budget, the quality of the film is beyond expectations. 

Nha also mentioned the ‘paradox’ in the advertisements for state-funded movies. The state spends money on making films, but doesn’t budget for distribution and marketing. This causes a headache to filmmakers. In many cases, the budgets that private investors spend on marketing for their films are nearly as big as the budgets for filmmaking.

Because of the popularity of the film, the Vietnam Cinema Department has proposed that the film will be distributed nationwide, not just at the National Cinema Center.

The department’s head, Vi Kien Thanh, told VietNamNet on February 20 that BETA Media has accepted to distribute the film with no profit.

Tinh Le