In September a group of festival organisers came to Viet Nam to select an award contender from among 30 series produced by two Vietnamese studio’s - VFC and HCM City’s Television Film Studio.

"This is the first time a Vietnamese series was presented at an international festival, which gave our filmmakers an opportunity to learn more about our strengths and weaknesses in the industry," said VFC director Khai Hung, who attended the festival.

The content of television series’ made-in-Viet Nam is just as good as in other countries, noted Hung, but there is a gap in overall quality because "our equipment is old and technologically behind."

Three other foreign series were chosen to present at the festival along with Viet Nam’s Buying Justice, including China’s Soldiers Sortie, Indonesia’s Searching for God and South Korea’s Golden Bride.

Founded in 2007, the International Drama Festival in Tokyo gathers more than 200 Japanese film studios together to present their products. Extracts from 180 series were presented during this year’s festival, which took place from October 22-24.

The festival aims to promote the distribution of Japanese broadcast efforts overseas. It is a networking forum for distributors and buyers to discuss the export potential of Japanese dramas internationally. — VNS