Asylum

Roughly 100 kilometers south of Hanoi, Vietnam, 130 patients at the Refunctional Center for the Mentally Ill live out what’s left of their lives. Remote and decaying, the compound is divided into two, with one part reserved for “serious case” patients deemed dangerous. About 30 of the patients are veterans of the French, American, Cambodian or Chinese wars with Vietnam. Some patients are housed 10 at a time in a 10-by-10 foot room with only a hole in the corner of the floor for a toilet; others are kept in solitary confinement. This is a glimpse of their lives, shot in a stolen 90 minutes.