VIETNAM: LONG TIME COMING

It was called the Vietnam Challenge, a tag that proves entirely accurate. A group of American military veterans, many disabled, joined native Vietnames athletes, also war-wounded, for a first-ever 16-day bicycle marathon along Route One thorugh the former Indochina in a living symbol of international friendship and reconciliation. “I looked into the face of innocence, and I found Vietnam,” exults one yankee at the warm reception he receives in a land where he fought and friends died. But as the cyclists ride into the countryside, past unchanged panoramas of rice paddies, through bitter reminders like My Lai, China Beach, the Ho Chi Minh Trail and the 17th Parallel, American participants wrestle with fresh flashbacks to firefights, B-52 strieks, violated corpses, Agent Orange and village children bearing grenades. The cameras witness deep-rooted rage and grief – and the healing – on both sides, as the Vietnam challenge nears Ho Chi Minh City for a triumphant finale and gentle epilogue. More than mere sports-umentary, VIETNAM: LONG TIME COMING surpasses dramatic fiction in capturing the legacy left behind by America's longest war, and shows how a shared test of endurance unites former enemies and affirms faith, hope, and yes, even peace with honor (English and Vietnamese with English subtitles)