CLAM DOG

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A jaded food courier runs into a moral dilemma where she has to make the decision to deliver an order that has been 'tainted'.

Jeannie Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American filmmaker born and raised in San Jose, now currently residing in Los Angeles. Her work plunges into the social issues and creates surreal dream-like narratives to strike a conversation. In Clam Dog Nguyen humorously plays on themes that aren't often explored: female perversion, the effect of life on apps, the workers behind the apps etc. Clam Dog follows a food courier as she meets the LA madness behind doors. Nguyen's films are always female lead and challenge the typical representation of women and minorities.

Nguyen << Usually my stories start from an image, and for Clam Dog, I envisioned a female driving a manual car, specifically something more on the rice rocket end (what I grew up around). My main motivation is to always put something on screen that is rarely seen, to expose others to different cultures and to show that females are just as interesting, multi-faceted and perverted like their male counterparts. Similar to my previous short, Sigh Gone, I carried this curiosity on how people heavily rely on their devices and how it has altered the way we interact with one another. Typing in acronyms, Instagram stalking, life ruining viral videos and dick pics, I wanted to highlight the comedic nuances that technology plays in our lives. If you look back, even just a few years back, you won't find this sort of app dependency. It’s as of recent that apps have changed the way we lead our lives, for better or for worse. We're in such a weird transitionary phase, and wanted to document it before it gets weirder.

This film was shot in 6 nights in June. Since it was summer, we were racing against the sun to get all of our shots. It was a VERY ambitious short film given our micro budget (it was self-funded by me and Andrew Yuyi Truong, my DP) and I learned a ton. Like, be aware of sprinklers (luckily no equipment got damaged), it's very difficult to fake an intersection at a plaza, and location rehearsals are a must for long takes. I worked with a lot of new, talented people (all my keys were female, minus Andrew!), which was great to have that support and creative input. Overall it was a very exhausting, rewarding, and fun experience and I can't wait to make the next one! >>


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