Indochine: Sur les traces d’une mère (Indochina: Traces of a Mother)

Indochine: Sur les traces d’une mère (Indochina: Traces of a Mother)
Idrissou Mora-Kpai, 2011, France/Benin/Vietnam, 71', French with English subs. Courtesy of the artist

Indochina, Traces of a Mother, Mora-Kpai follows an Afro-Vietnamese man on his search for his mother in Vietnam, weaving intimate personal memory with the shadows of colonial history. The film observes how individual lives intersect with larger historical forces, capturing both tenderness and the dislocations of post-colonial realities, and reflecting on motherhood, migration, and memory in a cinematic journey that is both emotional and historically poignant—and continues to be considered a pioneering documentary addressing the traces of the Tirailleurs in the Indochina War.