HEARTBOUND
Winner of the Golden Eye Award for Best International Documentary at the 2018 Zürich Film Festival
Winner of the Award for Best Feature at the 2018 American Anthropological Associations Film and Media Festival
Winner of the Richard Werbner Award for Visual Ethnography at the 2019 Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival
Winner of The Irish Council of Civil Liberties Film Award at the 2019 Virgin Media Dublin International Film Festival
Winner of Jury Award for Best International Documentary at Docville International Documentary Film Festival 2019
Sommai, a former sex worker from Pattaya, lives in the windswept Northern Jutland. 25 years ago, she came to Thy to marry Niels, and ever since, she has helped countless women from her village in Thailand marry Danish men. Now, it is her niece Kae's turn.
Sommai and Niels put a personal ad in the newspaper, and soon a suitor comes forward. In the meantime, in Thailand, another young woman, Saeng, tries to find a Danish man, but Sommai cannot help her, and instead, she has to go to Pattaya to provide for her son by working in the sex bars.
Ten years later, we meet all of them again and see what consequences their choices in life have had for themselves and their children.
'Heartbound' is an epic family chronicle and a migration story, shot in two small communities in two different parts of the world, bound together by a network of Thai women and their Danish husbands. Intimately and attentively, destinies, dreams and needs are woven together in an existential life journey.
Release: 20th of September 2018 (Denmark)
Duration: v1 90 minutes and v2 2x 58 minutes
Genre: Documentary feature
Spoken languages: Thai, Lao, English and Danish
Directors: Janus Metz and Sine Plambech
Production Company: Magic Hour Films and Metz Film
Coproducers: Upfront Films, BALDR Film, Vilda Bomben Film and Film i Väst
Production Countries: Denmark, Thailand, The Netherlands and Sweden
Cinematography: Henrik Bohn Ipsen, dff
Editors: Marion Seraina Tuor, bfs and Søren Ebbe
Sound Design: Niklas Skarp
Composer: Uno Helmersson
Producers: Lise Lense-Møller, Henrik Veileborg, Katja Draaijer, Frank Hoeve, Fredrik Lange and Simon Perry
Production Countries: Denmark, Thailand, The Netherlands and Sweden
Production Company: Magic Hour Films and Metz Film
Coproducers: Upfront Films, BALDR Film, Vilda Bomben Film and Film i Väst
Produced with support from: Eurimages, Anton Calleja and Roberto Olla, The Danish Film Institute, filmconsultants Klara Grunning and Cecilia Lidin, Swedish Film Institute, film commissioner Klara Grunning, Netherlands Film Fund, Doreen Boonekamp, Frank Peijnenburg and Suzanne van Voorst, Netherlands Film Production Incentive, Manon van Melick and Ilse Ronteltap, and Nordic Film and TV Fund, Documentary Advisor Karolina Lidin
Produced in cooperation with: DR, commissioning editor Anders Thomsen, SVT, commissioning editor Axel Arnö, VPRO, commissioning editor Barbara Truyen
Also nominated for the following prizes:
Nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at DOC NYC 2018
Nominated for the Basil Wright Film Prize at
The Royal Anthropological Institute Film Festival 2019
Nominated for the Nordic Competition at
Göteborg International Film Festival 2019
Nominated for Best Danish Documentary at Bodilprisen 2019
Nominated for the Critics Award at Documentarist Istanbul Documentary Days 2019
Winner of the Award for Best Documentary at Budapest International Documentary Festival 2020