Ngọc Lan

A government minister from Hanoi has a car accident on the way to a wedding in a remote village. The county hospital does not have the authority to operate on a minister. The county commissioner would like the operation done in the county for the prestige it would bring, but will not authorize it without the approval of the whole county committee. The hospital director has filled his quota, so does not want to take the risk of an operation. Since a telephone call to Hanoi has to be booked two days in advance, the minister's wife cannot be contacted, nor can a helicopter be arranged to move the minister to Hanoi.

In mid-1960s, groups of American paratroopers arrive at a Hmong village near the Vietnam-Laos border. Among the troops are former villagers who collaborated with the French; having returned home , they seek to win over the village’s support.

At a maternity ward in South Vietnam, a midwife adopts three orphaned children after their mothers, undercover Communist spies, go missing or die in action.

After a streak of betrayals in love, a scholar harbours a disdain for women and vows to stay away from their “venomous nature”. However, he soon grows increasingly obsessed with a prostitute he encountered one night, and falls deeply in love with her against the prejudices of his social class.

A director pays a visit to a hydroelectric plant construction site and gives a grandiose speech on the impending glory of its opening. His exaggerated body language soon becomes a running gag among the workers who pass around the rumour that he might have dropped the diamond ring during the speech, which the director ironically - and wholeheartedly- believes.