Agent Orange County

Think “immigrant” and what comes to mind? If it’s “Mexican” or Mayflower, check your head and check out Saigon, USA, an award-winning 2004 documentary that captures the Vietnamese experience post-Apocalypse Now. In the ’70s, thousands of refugees dodged Agent Orange and created Little Saigon in Orange County, California. The thriving...

By Peter Breslin

March 6, 2008

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Think “immigrant” and what comes to mind? If it’s “Mexican” or Mayflower, check your head and check out Saigon, USA, an award-winning 2004 documentary that captures the Vietnamese experience post-Apocalypse Now.

In the ’70s, thousands of refugees dodged Agent Orange and created Little Saigon in Orange County, California. The thriving community’s as American as Lee Greenwood, but it retains deep ties to what was once home. Lyndsay Jang’s film plays on this tension — and an incendiary incident in which a shopkeeper defiantly displayed a Communist flag and a picture of Ho Chi Minh — to peel away the layers of Vietnamese-American experience.

Thu., March 6, 6:30 p.m., 2008

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