About The Film
In 1945, at the end of World War II, the United States and Russia divided the Korean peninsula into two. The Russian supported North remained “Joseon”, the original name for the country as a whole while the US-backed South renamed itself to “Hanguk”, thus creating a divide between people that have otherwise the same language, ancestry and roots and who should otherwise have the same rights to the peninsula as a whole. Ever since, the two countries have been at loggerheads, a peace treatise following the Korean War in 1953 only existing in name. The propaganda machines for both countries have since been eager to call the government and the people of the other the cause of the problem and the obstacle standing in the way of a complete reunification.
Synopsis
Ever since his school days, director Jero Yun has been taught, just like his classmates and every other student in the country, to sing proudly for a reunification, while also being told that their Northern compatriots are horrible people. Living in the South, access to information on the North or North Korean websites is just as much censored as South Korean websites are banned in the North. But when he moves to France for studies, he is able to freely access these sites and information, at which point he realises that propaganda exists on both sides. Each side is being portrayed as the villain by the other to their people. Putting politics aside, it makes him wonder just how bad can people who are essentially of the same blood and heritage really be. Can a man-made border really change people this much? The only way he can truly know the answer to this, he figures, is to meet some North Koreans himself. Being a South Korean himself, this proves easier said than done, as Yun finds out when he arrives to cities of the China-North Korea border in hopes of meeting North Korean refugees, risking his life and freedom in doing so.
