Interview Sir Daniel Winn
Presented at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival’s Marché du Film, Chrysalis is a coming of age drama inspired by the life of Sir Daniel Winn. Exploring themes of memory, exile, and rebuilding, the film traces the journey of a Vietnamese child marked by war, family separations, and the redemptive power of art. Directed by J. Robert Schulz, this feature film blends intimate emotion with universal reflections on resilience, identity, and legacy.
What does presenting Chrysalis at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival mean to you?
The Cannes Film Festival is one of the most prestigious platforms in the cinema industry. To present Chrysalis at the Marché du Film at Cannes sets it on an international stage where distributors, buyers, and agents can view the film and share it with the world. Being at Cannes, even while not in competition, gives the movie a significant presence. And hopefully that will garner a lot of attention when it is released worldwide.
Why was it important for you to tell this story today, inspired by your childhood during the Vietnam War?
It took time for me to heal, to be able to come up, to allow the story to be told. Initially, I wrote a memoir. Based on that memoir, several producers approached me to create a feature movie or a limited series. It’s been several years since I declined. But within the last two years, I felt it was time. I’d worked with director J. Robert Schulz on two art films, so I was confident that the was the right person to translate my memoir to film. At this point in my life, I’m comfortable enough to face my demons. Hopefully, after my memoir, this will now help me resolve my issues, embrace what has happened, and move forward, and share something to the world that hopefully their experiences will be resolved as well.
The relationship between Daniel and his grandmother is at the emotional core of the film. Why is this family bond such an essential part of your memory?
For me, family is everything. When individuals have a parent or grandparent, sometimes we take it for granted until they’re gone. And once they’re gone, it is a little too late. Because then the ‘I could have’ or ‘I should have’ moment tears your emotions and eats inside of you for the rest of your life. What I want to share is that the family bond is very important. You don’t wait for the moment to be lost to appreciate it. With my experience, starting as such a young child, losing family, being abandoned, having no one, and then capturing it slightly again after decades, and then losing it again so brief, gives me an understanding of how strong that bond should be, and that every moment should be treasured and loved. Because once that’s gone, you will never have that again. Those memories are all that you have left. My goal is to have people see this movie and appreciate what they have now. Every moment with your family is the most precious in this world. Having the award-winning actress Kieu Chinh play my grandmother was ideal. Her performance captured the essence of unconditional love, reaching a universal audience.
Your visual universe is deeply influenced by your work as a sculptor and painter. How does your artistic aesthetic shape your approach to cinema?
As an artist, my goal is to communicate through visual language my philosophy of existential surrealism. What is the meaning of life? What is our purpose in this world? I create my sculptures in three dimensions and my paintings in two dimensions. And yet I feel that is still limited to my expression. With cinema, every frame is a painting. Every movement is a sculpture, three-dimensional. Multiply that exponentially, and there is so much more to communicate, where possibly endless frames carry my visual language with the same sensitivity and philosophy as my paintings or sculptures.
