Flick City 86: ‘Daughter’ Interviews With Corey Deshon, Vivien Ngô and Elyse Dinh

Penned and directed by Corey Deshon, Daughter is a slow build and immersive thriller about a young woman (Vivien Ngô) who is abducted and forced to live with a family. She is the surrogate “daughter,” and to survive she must bend to the whims of father (Casper Van Dien), mother (Elyse Dinh), and brother (Ian Alexander). Shot on 16mm with a micro-budget, this first rate feature comes out Friday in Theaters, Digital and On Demand. Deshon, Ngô (who also produced) and Dinh talked to us about the joys and challenges of making Daughter.

Three of the actors in Daughter (Ian Alexander, Elyse Dinh, Vivien Ngô) are Vietnamese American, and Corey Deshon is a Black filmmaker. Minority representation is a huge plus in the feature, and the movie also packs a punch. Genre driven features can be enjoyed on a surface level, but credit goes to Deshon and company for digging beneath the surface and giving cinephiles a thing or two to ponder.

What truly consitutes as freedom? Is assimilation and the need to survive commendable? The characters in Daughter are attempting to exist in their own separate fashion, and when these different beliefs collide, tragedy (or a breakthrough) may ensue.

Check out my podcast interviews with Corey Deshon, Vivien Ngô and Elyse Dinh below. I will be posting the video versions of these chats later this week. But for now, let’s get into the audio (Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, and Spotify media players are below):

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Catch Daughter in theaters, VOD, and digital starting Friday, February 10.