Cu Li Never Cries

Mrs Nguyen returns to Vietnam after a trip to Germany to collect her husband’s ashes. Along with the ashes, he leaves her a slow loris (a primate known in Vietnam as a “cu li”). Nguyen lives with her niece, Vân, who is about to marry due to an unexpected pregnancy and is anxious about her uncertain future. Mrs Nguyen disapproves of both the marriage and the child, fearing her niece will repeat her own mistakes. This contemplative and poetic character study blends the present with the complex reverberations of Vietnamese history, weaving imagery that is both realist and fantastical.