In the snowy hills of Park City this year, North Korea refugee documentary “Beyond Utopia” made a splash. This 115-minute feature keeps its viewers at the edge of their seats. In follows the harrowing defection journeys for the Roh family, which includes two children and an octogenarian, and records the brutal capture and torture of Soyeon Lee's son at the North Korean border (heard, of course, just through telephone calls with brokers).
Throughout the course of the film, the proximity to the subject material is quite jarring. The American film crew witnesses the Roh family and Pastor Kim, their South Korean guardian, through the Yalu River, China, the jungles of Laos, and eventually reaching the Thai shores of the Mekong River.
Now, in light of awards season, we revisit our own close encounter with the team – an in-person interview with producers Sue Mi Terry, Rachel Cohen, and documentary subjects Pastor Kim and Soyeon Lee – at the Larsen office in San Francisco.
Producer Rachel Cohen launched the roundtable. “[Beyond Utopia] started with us. Jana [Edelbaum] and I have a New York-based production company, and Jana had read Hyeonsoo Lee's book The Girl with Seven Names. We were really blown away by the insanity of it – and the fact that we knew nothing about [the North Korean] world.”
She recalls that they met Pastor Kim through an article that director Madeleine Gavin had read about him and started their relationship with him, circa 2019. As everyone notes, this is not Pastor Kim's nor Soyeon's first rodeo in front of the camera. In fact, their televisual presence is precisely part of their appeal. Pastor Kim appeared on a slate of other North Korean documentaries and broadcasts by PBS, BBC, and so on. And – with over 1000 defection missions over the last 23 years – he has been been successful with each and every one, save for three. Soyeon, on the other hand, is a regular on the South Korean TV program “Now I am on my way to meet you,” where she and other refugees talk about their hardships. While she personally knew Pastor Kim through the program, she reached out to him to ask for help with rescuing her son.
While Producer Cohen gives me the low-down in English, Pastor Kim turns to me in Korean. “When I've been in documentaries for HBO and other documentaries, I always say to myself, this will be the last time. You can only risk your life so much. But each time, after a successful mission, I think, maybe I can just do one more. I've thought this over 1000 times, and 23 years just flew by,” he chuckles.
Despite all the dangers, I also note how it's interesting to see how the refugees seem to be traveling in relative safety compared to other refugee films emerging in the last few years, like “Flee” and “The Swimmers.” The Roh family traverses in cars with seatbelts, not the back of trucks; they almost always have a roof over their heads on each step of the journey. What is more, they seem to be treated as individuals, rather than as herds of cattle let loose abroad.
Pastor Kim does not even raise an eyebrow. “That's why we go ourselves,” he says simply, folding his hands. Soyeon interjects as well. “The journeys [from North Korea] are equally perilous,” she notes. “Many [North Korean] women get objectified and sold into brothels and sex slavery [during their escape]. Honestly, the light of God is what really guided the Roh family to Pastor Kim. Their experience [as seen on film] is not a typical escape route [for many refugees].”
As the conversation went on, I began to realize that this was also not a typical documentary interview. Compared to other documentary crews I had interviewed before – many of whom were eager to talk about the craft or the formal qualities of their project – everyone in the room seemed vested in the deep political stakes of the film's contents. Over and over again, Pastor Kim and Soyeon insisted that people need to see this film for awareness on issues regarding North Korea – in terms of sex trafficking, refugee journeys, and the sheer extent of the country's ideological brainwashing.
Producer Sue Mi Terry, who had previously worked on other documentaries about North Korea, also weighed in on the conversation in the Korean peninsula. “The greatest irony with South Korean policy and the progressive administration [under previous President Moon Jae-in] is that they get very paranoid about upsetting the Kim Jung-un regime. Because of this, they don't necessarily support defection, and instead are trying to engage with North Korea. There's a careful balancing act with the US too.”
Producer Cohen also weighed in. “There's a dehumanization of North Korean people [in the West], because we see them in these tropes of an obedient drone or as a hungry figure. It's really hard too, because the public has no access to them.” Producer Terry agreed. In light of the urgent nuclear stand-off, human rights issues get cast in the shadows. Color rising to her cheeks, Terry noted with urgency, “When we only see a funny leader with funny hair and platform shoes like the TIME Magazine portrayal of the regime, it gives us a skewed sense of what a real North Korean is. The focus is never on the 20 million people who live there.”
I asked them about the tendency to exoticize North Korea, especially in both Korean and Korean-diaspora movie like “Crossings”, “Crash Landing on You,” and “JSA.” Producer Terry responded stalwartly, “In this really liberal landscape of the [South Korean] film industry with the progressive government, South Korea oftentimes portrays North Korea as the ‘real Korea' – parroting North Korean rhetoric about S. Korea being the ‘puppet state of the US.'”
Both producers and Pastor Kim then redirected me to a key moment in “Beyond Utopia”. Here, the film crew interviews the grandmother of the Roh family before she reaches a Hanawon, the South Korean resettlement and job training center. Here, Grandmother Roh unabashedly praises Kim Jung-un. “We're seeing indoctrination as it is unfolding. This is all happening in real time,” Producer Terry underscored. The chorus was clear: ‘Beyond Utopia' sought to raise awareness about the North Korean situation in 2023.
I found it interesting, then, when Pastor Kim mulled over filming that moment as well. While he also was concerned about the political stakes, he also reflected upon his interactions with the Roh family with awe. “[Grandmother Roh] is over eighty years old. She has seen so much. She got married during Japanese colonization; went through the regimes of Kim Il-Sung and Kim Jong-il; and then escaped during the Kim Jung-un regime.” He took a moment to step back, eyes glazing over at the memory again. “I think seeing the younger kids too – when they were at the brink of death, exhausted, but still tried to wipe off the sweat from each other's brow [in the jungle at the last step of their journey] – reminded me of the beauty of humanity. Between happiness and sorrow, there is some beauty still.”
Soyeon similarly echoed the sentiments, though in relation to our location. “It's my first time in California,” she confessed. “I've been to DC, but I've been in awe since I've come here. It's so different from what we've been told about the ‘American bastards' in North Korea. The US is so much bigger and more diverse than I had imagined.”
Finally, I asked them if things have changed with the onset of the pandemic between 2020-2023. Pastor Kim shook his head. “Everything changed. In North Korea, the border became stricter. Escaping during COVID-19 was almost unthinkable. The North Korean rescue fees have also inflated by 10 times the cost, because of the Hong Kong situation. When wealthier folks escape from Hong Kong through the Southeast Asia, they go through the same paths as our own escapees – and they pay so much more. So the calculus for brokers becomes such that, for every 1 Hong Kong refugee, they would have to transport 10 North Korean refugees [at pre-pandemic costs] to make a profit. It's become much harder for churches and NGOs alike. It costs $20,000 for a single rescue.”
As practical as Pastor Kim is though, he is still, at the end of the day, a pastor. As much as he is confident about his history, he acknowledged the difficulty of the situation. “The results are ultimately up to God. We've been able to save 4 more people since the production of the film, but – it hurts, since it cost the same as it would have to save 40 people before the pandemic.”
Soyeon, on the other hand, seems to have more faith in her viewers. “As someone who lived in North Korea – and had no idea about the world beyond myself – I hope everyone who sees this film will be able to understand a mother's heart for her son, and be invested in and know what is happening across the Korean border.” Pastor Kim agreed. “Ultimately, I hope viewers will feel a sense of obligation, and will want to do something about the situation.”
Distribution for Academy Award-eligible “Beyond Utopia” is managed by Roadside Attractions.
