Heaven & Earth

SYNOPSIS

Heaven & Earth follows the true story of a Vietnamese village girl who survives a life of suffering and hardship during and after the Vietnam War. Eventually she meets a U.S. Marine named Steve who marries her and brings her to a new life in the States.
The final movie in Oliver Stone's Vietnam trilogy recounts the epic journey of Phung Le Ly's life, which began in an idyllic village in Central Vietnam living as her people had lived for thousands of years. When the war broke out, she was plunged into a maelstom, trapped between the forces of North and South. Separated from her family, Le Ly was imprisoned by the South Vietnamese, who used an assortment of tactics on her, including electric shock treatment, and upon release from prison, she was raped by a vicious gang of Viet Cong. After escaping to Saigon, she becomes pregnant by an employer and is fired. She turns to prostitution to survive, until Steve Butler (Tommy Lee Jones), an American Special Forces officer, impulsively asks her to marry him and return to America with him.