Reading MS Access 2003 Unicode strings into VB6 - ms-access

Question

I created a MS Access (2003) table, using VB6. Naturally, even though VB6 on the surface works strictly with ANSI character set, under the hood, strings are internally correctly stored in fully UNICODE. The proof is the fact that when I write my data, containing diacritic characters to MS Access, database its flawless.
I want to underline that the date in my MS Access 2003 contains a field that is "Directory+Filenames (full path)" pointing to files on my HDD with diacritic characters.
Great, so far so good. Now for the problem!
When I turn back and read those records containing diacritic characters from MS Access 2003 and feed the "Directory+Filenames (full path)" to say, VLC Media Player, it does not find it, because VB6 internally striped diacritic signs.
Is this such rare case? No similar cases found on the web.
Thanks to an unknown soul.
EDIT More info from the question asker.
above all thanks. Yes, I'm using VB6 (classic); an old timer, but for fun. Here's a subroutine that tries to invoke VLC.
Private Sub GoPlay(**FileToPlay** As String)
Const vlc_exe = "C:\Program Files\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc.exe "
FileToPlay = vlc_exe + """" + **FileToPlay** + """"
Me.Enabled = False ' Block any futher action on the Form before the current film showing doesn't end
'=================
' Go play video
'=================
StartVLC_common FileToPlay ' Go play video
Me.Enabled = True
Me.ZOrder
End Sub
As you see I pass the argument as String. That may be the problem!
This is how "StartVLC_common" is defined:
Public Function StartVLC_common(VideoToShow As String)
'===================================== ' Start a process, in this case VLC
'=====================================
On Error Resume Next
StopVLC_common ' Avoid multiple brands playing, so kill any previous instance
'=====================================
' Start the process.
VideoToShow = Trim$(VideoToShow)
If VideoToShow = "" Then
Exit Function
End If
glPid = Shell(VideoToShow, vbNormalFocus)
If glPid = 0 Then
MsgBox "Could not start process", vbExclamation, "Error"
End If
End Function
Good news! Thanks to different people suggestions, I did some brainstorming and came to the conclusion. Before I was passing VB string to subroutine "GoPlay" containing file name to play. Now I pass ADO recordset field read directly from MS Access table that contains the file name to play.
Thanks to all.