The Profound Life of Sir Daniel Winn Through His Film Chrysalis

There are films that entertain, and there are films that echo long after the screen fades to black — Chrysalis is the latter. Based on the profound life of world-renowned Vietnamese-American artist Sir Daniel K. Winn, Chrysalis is a cinematic meditation on memory, abandonment, and the quiet resilience of the human spirit. Directed by American filmmaker J. Robert Schulz, the film unites a diverse international cast and crew, with producers including Winn and Randall J. Slavin of WS Productions.

Set during the final years of the Vietnam War, between 1972 and 1975, the autobiographical film follows a young boy and his grandmother as they navigate the uncertainty leading up to the fall of Saigon. But this is no traditional war film. The conflict stays mostly offscreen, felt more in silence than spectacle. Instead, Chrysalis invites viewers into the intimate terrain of emotional survival — a space shaped not by armies or ideologies, but by hunger, grief, and the enduring bond between generations.

From War Child to Artist: Sir Daniel Winn’s Journey Through Chrysalis

Rooted in his philosophy of Existential Surrealism, Chrysalis mirrors Winn’s lifelong exploration of how beauty, meaning, and identity emerge from chaos — both on canvas and in life itself. His award-winning conceptual short film trilogy—Creation, Ectropy, and the upcoming Entropy—has already established him as a compelling visual storyteller. These silent films delve into themes of chaos and order, existence, duality, universal truths, and the search for meaning, offering a cinematic expression of his artistic philosophy. While they gesture toward a fusion of narrative and visual philosophy, it is in Chrysalis that this synthesis reaches its most fully realized form, delving into the untold past of an artist shaped by a difficult and harrowing early life. “It’s a journey that has shaped who I am,” reveals Winn. “And now I’m ready to open that chapter to everyone.”

What begins as a deeply personal narrative — drawn from Winn’s own traumatic, war-torn childhood and adapted from his forthcoming memoir — unfolds into something quietly universal. Through a child’s eyes, we see not only the devastation of war, but the redemptive power of life, love, art, and sacrifice. In this world, a bicycle is not just a means of transportation, a watch not just a timekeeper, and an apple is never just food. Every object, every image, carries the weight of memory and metaphor.

Though the war is not shown directly in Chrysalis, it is present in every silence and shadow. South Vietnam in the early seventies was a place where conflict seeped into daily life — not through battlefield scenes, but through absence, rationing, and sudden goodbyes. For Daniel, that absence was personal: a father presumed dead, a mother whose choices took her further away, and a series of losses that left his grandmother as his only steady presence. The war’s impact wasn’t just in what was destroyed, but in what it forced people to give up — homes, safety, certainty. Against that backdrop, the smallest acts of care took on deep meaning, and the seeds of Winn’s resilience — and eventual artistry — were quietly planted.

With a screenplay adapted by Andrew Creme, Chrysalis captures only a brief but defining chapter of Winn’s life. His forthcoming memoir will expand on these formative years with even greater intimacy and tell the broader story. It traces his journey from a childhood marked by scarcity and upheaval in Vietnam to his eventual life in America, revealing how those early experiences forged his artistic vision. Where the film shows the child’s view, the memoir steps back, revealing the complexity behind each moment: the deeper losses within his family, the disorienting reality of exile, and the way creativity became a form of survival. On the page, the symbols that recur in the film are given fuller context, rooted in the texture of real places and moments. Together, the memoir and the film form a dialogue between mediums, each enriching the other, each preserving the story in a different way.

Though born from Winn’s own life in wartime Vietnam, Chrysalis is not just the story of an immigrant or an artist — it is a human story of survival, resilience, and transformation. It speaks to universal themes: overcoming abuse, navigating family fractures, enduring scarcity, and finding strength in the face of abandonment. In its core truths, it is less about a specific country or era and more about the struggles and triumphs that shape us all.

The Bond That Holds the Story Together

At the heart of Chrysalis is the relationship between young Daniel and his grandmother, Bà Nội — the emotional anchor in a life otherwise defined by loss and scarcity. She is portrayed by legendary Vietnamese actress Kiều Chinh, whose career spans more than six decades, from The Joy Luck Club to M*A*S*H. With almost imperceptible grace, Chinh crafts one of her most quietly searing performances, embodying both the fragility and unshakable strength of a woman shaped by survival. This cinematic homecoming is a study in the paradox of resilience, where fragility and fortitude exist not in opposition, but inextricably entwined.

Bà Nội was once a woman of status and means, her life framed by elegance and stability. But war and politics reduced her world to near ruin — property seized, loved ones lost, dignity eroded. She now lives in a crumbling shack on the edge of the city, her home as worn and weary as her own spirit. Yet in caring for Daniel, she finds a reason to endure. “While filming, I often missed my grandmother and the simple, joyful days we shared despite incredible hardships,” explains Daniel. “I hope audiences feel the love at the heart of this story.”

Young Daniel, played by eight-year-old Nguyễn Vũ Uy Nhân in a career-defining role, is a wide-eyed, artistic child abandoned by his mother after his father was presumed dead in the war. Bà Nội rescues him from his mother’s abusive new husband, bringing him into her care. She feeds him with what little she has, waking before dawn each day to prepare bánh mì, bánh xèo, and bánh cuốn to sell at the market. When food runs short, Daniel resorts to stealing apples from neighbors’ trees — not out of mischief, but necessity. That apple becomes one of the film’s central symbols: at once a token of survival, a gesture of defiance, and a reminder of the thin line between innocence and sin.

Realizing she cannot provide for him much longer, Bà Nội makes a decision that becomes one of the most poignant moments in the film. She trades her late husband’s gold watch — her last link to a better time — for a red bicycle and a sketchbook. In Winn’s symbolic language, these are more than gifts. They are offerings of freedom and imagination, a chance for Daniel to carry pieces of beauty into the uncertain future.

The World Beyond Home

When Daniel is sent to a boarding school for children orphaned or separated from their families due to the war, the tone of Chrysalis shifts. The building is stark and shadowed, its walls echoing with the sounds of children but holding little warmth. Here, he encounters both cruelty and unexpected kindness. Trần Phan Thanh Tùng, in his first film role, plays Thắng — the relentless bully whose torment forces Daniel into acts of quiet rebellion.

Guidance comes from the orphanage’s autistic caretaker, Chú Tèo, played with touching subtlety by veteran comedian Trịnh Tú Trung, whose performance here moves far beyond humor. Even in the harsh environment, Daniel’s sketchbook and memories of his grandmother keep him tethered to something brighter.

The sequences here bear the unmistakable mark of Schulz, who shapes each scene with a painter’s patience. Working closely with German-American cinematographer Alexander Bonelli, Schulz crafts compositions that feel suspended between memory and dream. Natural light filters through wooden shutters like fragments of memory breaking through grief, while shadows creep in from the edges, suggesting the constant threat of loss.

Co-producers Trương Ngọc Ánh and Tien Pham step in front of the camera as well, portraying Daniel’s birth mother, Lan, and his abusive stepfather. Their scenes are among the film’s most harrowing — especially when juxtaposed with the tenderness of Bà Nội. Samuel An, the Vietnamese-Swiss actor who plays Daniel’s father, Long, carrying both the promise of reunion and the shadow of further separation.

“Vietnam is a land of deep cultural richness and striking beauty,” Winn said. “Collaborating with Trương Ngọc Ánh and her team on Chrysalis is a true honor. This film is more than a creative project — it serves as a bridge between Vietnam’s dynamic artistic heritage and audiences around the world.”

As the war’s final days approach, the family’s fragile stability unravels. This is where Sir Daniel Winn steps into his own story. Playing himself across the arc of the film — not as a symbolic cameo, but as a fully realized presence — he delivers scenes of raw introspection that anchor the film’s emotional truth. His portrayal feels lived-in because it is; these are not imagined memories but embodied ones, drawn directly from the raw reality that inspired Chrysalis.

Though rooted in a specific time and place, Chrysalis speaks to universal experiences — the search for belonging, the ache of separation, the will to endure — themes that anyone, anywhere, can recognize in their own life. Daniel Winn is not just telling his own story, but giving voice to those whose experiences often go unheard.