Once Upon a Time in Cabramatta (DVD / iTunes Digital Download)
The untold story of how the Vietnamese community overcame the odds and found their place in multicultural Australia. Read More
Overview

Winner AACTA 2013 Award for Best Editing in a Documentary
Once Upon a Time in Cabramatta is the untold story of how the Vietnamese community in Cabramatta overcame the odds and found their place in multicultural Australia.
The story begins with the landmark decision of Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser to open Australia’s doors to thousands of refugees at the end of the Vietnam War. It is a moment in history that finally buries the infamous White Australia Policy and transforms a nation.
The years that follow are as dramatic as they are turbulent. In this one tiny Sydney suburb, the 1980s and 1990s see the emergence of street gangs, a heroin epidemic and the first political assassination in Australia’s history. The Vietnamese people are vilified and demonised. Cabramatta it seems, represents all that is wrong with Asian immigration - the universal support for multiculturalism a distant memory.
But as the century draws to a close there is a remarkable turnaround. The Vietnamese people finally find their voice and claim their rightful, democratic place in their adopted home. Cabramatta is a community transformed. Australia, a continent changed forever.
Subtitles: English, Vietnamese
Product Reviews (15)
real good documentary tho i have such a bad feeling.. anyway, this is what ppl should watch them.
You can only watch rubbish for so long and this pile of sensationalist, racist nonsense is like the Underbelly of stupidity! I met John Newman. I have known Vietnamese educated people who see that the worst elements of the Vitenamese society as well as the worst were admitted and that the sort of smarmy, upper class snobs who make rubbbish like this, have NO understanding nor do the necessary research to make good documentary if this is an example. A classic example is the way that they portray Malcolm Fraser as agonising over whether to admit Vietnamese refugees to Australia when the reality as all educated people know is that we are party to a United Nations Refugee agreement which IMPELS us to admit refugees. There was No choice (thank god). We adnitted refugees and the Prime Minister had NO right to refuse. Did the documenta...ry makers not know this? I have a Master's degree in researching this period in Cabramatta's history. The filmmakers quote again and again a dubious professor as an icon of immigration history (where was Stephen Castke?) who speaks as an authority without any explanation of such authority. The whole DVD smells more like propaganda than documentary to advance a sensationalist and overblown account and to inflame racial hatred of the Vietnamese Cabramatta experience while disgustingly and vilely pretending to be diffusing prejudice. This is a pathetic and poorly produced DVD which is clearky designed to produce a racist divide while mendaciously expressing the opposite.
The best documentary ever!
Hi TLam, Sorry we are having technical issues with our price information. Please click the green "Buy it Now" button above. It will take you to the Dymocks product page which includes the price. You can decide there if you want to buy the DVD or not.
Excellent documentary Tv series.
how much is the DVD ?
We expected better. It was a vital piece of history in the region and could have served better as a documentary with concise interviews insteal of waffling all over the place, very amateurishly handled. Where was the editor?
Everyone should watch this! Fascinating, informative, a work of art. I was captivated. This insight into the often shocking history of a Sydney suburb casts light onto a shadowy chapter of Australia's past, demanding acknowledgment of the present realities it has created.
Hi Jimmy, No this release does not include a Blu-ray version.
Will there be blu-ray version? Since the documentary was shown in HD on TV.
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