On February 24, "House of Ancestors" directed by Huynh Lap achieved a revenue of 103 billion VND after 5 days of release, according to statistics from Box Office Vietnam.
The film topped the box office with more than 4,000 screenings, overwhelming the remaining films such as "Dark Nuns: The dark Sisterhood", "The Billion Dollar Kiss", "Captain America: The New World"...
This achievement helped "House of Ancestors" enter the top 5 Vietnamese films with the highest opening revenue in history, after "The Four Guardians", "Mai", "Nha Ba Nu", "Bo Gia".
Huynh Lap's film is labeled 18+, a horror comedy, revolving around My Tien (Phuong My Chi) - a Gen Z content creator - witnessing many spiritual phenomena in the ancestral home.
One day, she suddenly saw Gia Minh (Huynh Lap) - her brother who passed away 10 years ago. Many tragic situations occurred when the two brothers tried to keep the old house - which was being disputed by relatives, demanding to sell it to divide the family's inheritance.
While the film caused a fever at the box office, on social networking platforms such as Facebook, TikTok, audiences competed to show off photos of eating banh xeo, going home to watch their mother pour banh xeo...
The trend of eating banh xeo comes from the plot of the movie "House of Ancestors". In the film, Hai The dried fruit shop is not only a setting but also has the meaning of the traditional beauty of the family. This is a familiar dish of the West, associated with the childhood memories of the characters.
In the scenes of pouring banh xeo, director Huynh Lap invited his family members to join the pouring of cakes according to the recipe left by his grandmother.
After watching the film, many viewers said they went to eat banh xeo to enjoy the flavor of the film. Some people returned to their hometown to see their mother driving a bus and shared that they felt more attached to the intimate moments with their family.
Some videos of the audience eating banh xeo and learning to make banh xeo after watching "House of Ancestors" attracted hundreds of thousands of views.
Director Huynh Lap said that selling banh xeo was the job that helped his grandmother raise 9 children. Therefore, he included this dish in the film as a way to promote the beauty of Vietnamese cuisine.
Banh xeo khieu's skin is made from rice flour, with the fresh yellow color of turmeric and the aroma of coconut milk. The filling is made from many different ingredients including minced meat, shrimp, and bean sprouts. When enjoying banh xeo, diners often roll the cake with mustard greens, lettuce, herbs and dipped in sweet and sour fish sauce.
The way of preparing banh xeo shows the characteristics of local cuisine.
Western banh xeo has a variety of meat such as pork, duck, shrimp, shrimp... The meat is minced and stir-fried with spices first. Put the flour in an old hot oil pan, add meat, shrimp, vegetables such as bean sprouts, lentils, nature... and fry until the filling is cooked, the crunchy golden cake crust is doubled and then serve on a plate.
Meanwhile, in the Central region, small banh xeo, made in cast iron pans, people often pour a lot of oil, then pour the flour. The cake crust in the Central region is often thicker, softer, and not as thin and crispy as in the West.
