High hopes of promoting Vietnam’s tourism through films

An episode about Vietnam’s Son Doong Cave in the television series BBC Planet Earth III has received two nominations at the 2024 Emmy Awards, which once again shows the potential for introducing the country’s images to the world through films.

The second sinkhole of Son Doong Cave, also called "Garden of Edam" (Photo: Oxalis)

These nominations are among the five Emmy nominations for the series of BBC at the 2024 Emmy Awards.

Episode 6 - “Extremes”, broadcast on November 26, 2023, features breathtaking scenes of Son Doong Cave in the Phong Nha - Ke Bang National Park, the central province of Quang Binh.

It is nominated in two categories, namely “Outstanding Cinematography For A Nonfiction Programme” and “Outstanding Music Composition For A Documentary Series Or Special (Original Dramatic Score)”.

The BBC crew started filming in early 2022 and worked for over three weeks to capture the beauty of Son Doong, En, Va, and Nuoc Nut caves.

Nguyen Ngoc Quy, Director of the Quang Binh Department of Tourism, said local authorities and the Phong Nha - Ke Bang National Park management board created conditions and supported the film crew.

BBC is a big broadcaster with audiences around the world, so its selection of Son Doong Cave as a filming location is already a success for Vietnam. When the episode is broadcast or receives awards, the cave is expected to become more popular in the world, he noted.

Oxalis, the only company licensed to operate adventure tours to Son Doong, assisted the BBC crew during their stay in Vietnam.

Its representative noted they hope that by spotlighting the beauty of Son Doong and other caves, the Planet Earth III series of BBC will help attract more tourists, especially international ones, to Quang Binh.

The company also believes that its staff’s enthusiasm and industriousness will help turn Quang Binh in particular and Vietnam in general into a leading tourist destination, and open up new opportunities for large projects with global media giants.

This is not the first time the world’s largest cave has been featured in international television series or films.

In 2016, a documentary about Son Doong was screened in the Good Morning America programme of ABC. In following years, images of the cave appeared in the music video “Alone, Pt. II” of famous DJ Alan Walker, the “Son Doong Cave in 360 degrees” project of National Geographic, or the documentary “A Crack in the Mountain”.

The Lao dong (Labour) daily cited Director Vo Thanh Hoa as saying that nothing is better than popularising images via films because travel videos only showcase images while films also include stories and emotions, leaving better impression of Vietnamese destinations and landscapes on the audience.

Many Vietnamese films have also created good tourism effects for localities. For example, “Toi thay hoa vang tren co xanh” (I see yellow flowers in the green grass) made central Phu Yen province widely known on the tourism map. “Tet o lang Dia Nguc” (Hellbound Village) or “Ke an hon” (Soul Eater) also triggered an influx of travellers to remote Sao Ha village in Dong Van district, the northernmost province of Ha Giang.

Many international works like The Creator (2023), Kong: Skull Island (2017), Life (2017), and Pan (2015) were also filmed in Ha Long Bay, indicating the Vietnamese nature’s attractiveness in foreign filmmakers’ eyes.

However, Vietnam and its localities still need to work harder to attract more filmmakers.

In late 2023, the Production Attraction Index (PAI) was launched to serve the development of cinematography, and Phu Yen is the first to pilot this index.

Some localities like Khanh Hoa province and Ho Chi Minh City are also building professional film locations, considered a direction for concurrently developing the film and tourism industries./.

VNA