Showing posts with label Indochina. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Indochina. Show all posts

Saturday 11 March 2017

Vietnam - Star director’s new gig: tourism ambassador

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King-sized: Kong: Skull Island, the mega-budget blockbuster is the biggest Hollywood project filmed in Việt Nam to date. — Photo courtesy of Legendary and Warner Bros.  
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HÀ NỘI — Jordan Vogt-Roberts, director of the new Hollywood blockbuster Kong: Skull Island, was voted Việt Nam’s next tourism ambassador by a 13-member council under the Ministry of Culture and Sport.
The American director is expected to be officially appointed next Monday. In an earlier exchange, Vogt-Roberts said he was happy to represent the country and promote its image to the international art community.
Kong: Skull Island’ is a joint US$190 million production between two major film powerhouses: Legendary and Warner Bros. The movie is expected to be a smash hit at the box office, attracting millions of viewers worldwide. Serving as our next tourism ambassador, Jordan Vogt-Roberts will bring about great coverage and improve the image of Việt Nam globally,” the council said.
In numerous videos featuring the making of the US blockbuster, the director and the film cast did not hide their admiration for Việt Nam’s pristine scenery, landscapes and local hospitality.
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“I don’t think most of the world knows how gorgeous Việt Nam looks. You see shapes and landscapes that you didn’t know existed in ages. It’s beautiful,” said Vogt-Roberts in a Youtube video.
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“And you just fall in love with the culture, the people and everything about this country.  And the places there, they are just spectacular,” he said.
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2016 Oscar Best Actress winner Brie Larson plays war photojournalist Mason Weaver. She said that “Việt Nam in particular is very special because it has never been captured on film before in this way.”
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“Promoting the image of a country and its tourism potential through cinema is important. A successful movie can inspire audiences to travel to its filming locations,” said deputy head of General Department of Tourism Ngô Hoài Chung.
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“There was already a similar case in Việt Nam. After the success of Vietnamese box office hit Tôi thấy hoa vàng trên cỏ xanh (Yellow flowers on green grass), central province of Phú Yên, where the movie was filmed, has seen a surge in the number of visitors."
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Chung also said steps have already been taken to preserve Kong: Skull Island filming locations for future plans.
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Directed by Jordan Vogt-Roberts, Kong: Skull Island was shot in three provinces of Ninh Bình, Quảng Ninh and Quảng Bình. It is the biggest Hollywood movie ever to be filmed in Việt Nam.
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The movie premiered in Việt Nam on Thursday, a day before it hit international cinemas. — VNS
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Cambodia - BigPhone dials into local market

A man browses Facebook on his smartphone in Phnom Penh.
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 Mobile World Investment Corp (MWG) – one of the largest mobile phone and electronic products distribution chains in Vietnam – will open its first store in Cambodia, operating under the name BigPhone.com, according to Vietnamese state media.
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Construction on the first 150- to 200-square-metre store in Phnom Penh is nearly completed and the branch is expected to open this quarter, Vietnam News Agency reported on Wednesday.
The English-language news outlet quoted MWG director-general Tran Kinh Doanh as saying Cambodia was the first market for the company’s regional expansion, which will also see stores opened in Myanmar and Laos.
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“Cambodia was chosen to be the first country for the group to approach in Indochina,” he said.
Established in Ho Chi Minh City in 2014, MWG is a fast-growing retail chain for mobile phones and digital devices, including mobile phones, tablets and accessories. It operates a network of stores as well as an online channel.
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MWG (Cambodia) Co Ltd registered with Cambodia’s Ministry of Commerce last October. The company’s Vietnamese directors could not be reached for comment yesterday.
A study on cellphone and internet use in Cambodia published last year by the Asia Foundation revealed that the Kingdom’s market was already heavily saturated. Over 94 percent of Cambodians claimed to own their own phone handset, with nearly 40 percent of those surveyed claiming to have at least one smartphone.
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Bung Hor, CEO of T-Shop, a Phnom-Penh based electronics products distributor with eight branches, said yesterday that demand for mobile phones and accessories had grown significantly with deepening smartphone penetration. 

He said the rising demand had driven his company’s expansion, and he was confident there was still room in the market for new retailers of mobile phones and their accessories.
“There are more and more competitors while the demand is also higher,” he said.
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Source - PhnomPenhPost