How Kim Jong Il Kidnapped a Director, Made a Cult Hit Godzilla Knockoff (2015)

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2015/04/pulgasari-north-korea-cult-hit

by bschne • 1 year ago

73 35 1 year ago

vanityfair.com

domoregood• 1 year ago

Story is from 2015, but here's the readable link anyhow:

https://archive.is/ldZDX

ivape• 1 year ago

Why did they have to resort to kidnapping though? There's so many people that will do anything for money. I must be missing something about North Korea.

JumpCrisscross2• 1 year ago

I must be missing something about North Korea

Sanctions.

Rendello2• 1 year ago

Though interestingly:

though Kim despised the Japanese, he set aside his pride and flew in the special-effects team of the original films, along with Kenpachiro Satsuma, the man inside the Godzilla suit. According to Satsuma, he and his crew members thought they had been hired for a film shooting in China when they landed in North Korea instead.

The production and release sections of the Wikipedia article are interesting. It was intended for wide release by a Japanese company, then banned by the NK government after the director fled. In the 90s it saw a wide release, even in South Korea. The then-escaped director tried to sue it off the air.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulgasari

calgarymicro2• 1 year ago

At the time this movie was being made I don't think NK was any more sanctioned than any other Eastern Bloc country, and plenty of other Eastern Bloc countries had little issue scraping together enough cash to pay westerners to do stuff

rawgabbit• 1 year ago

https://chrissmith.house.gov/uploadedfiles/testimony_of_kim_...

Other political crimes that I came to know of after I was incarcerated in the prison camp. “The crime of talking about a cyst/lump on Kim Il Sung‟s neck.” “The crime of (unwittingly) damaging or soiling the statue or portrait of Kim Il Sung.” “The crime of knowing about the private life of Kim Jong-il. For example, knowing about Sung Hae Rim being the hidden mistress of Kim Jong-il, and disclosing this information to an outsider.” “The crime of revealing the birth of Kim Jong Nam, the firstborn son of Kim Jong-il” “The crime of listening to or viewing foreign radio or TV.” “The crime of questioning or criticizing the policy of the Worker‟s Party.” “The crime of expressing criticism or complaints about North Korea society.”

snkzxbs• 1 year ago

I don’t think information about the NK regime posted on house.gov should be completely believed.

cookiemonsieur• 1 year ago

I must be missing something about North Korea.

Other than, irrational, comical western propaganda, not much no.

marc_abonce• 1 year ago

Just to clarify, the article is from 2015, but the actual movie is from 1985:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulgasari

Rendello2• 1 year ago

It's on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHV-UOdBek0

CameronBanga• 1 year ago

This is why the movie tariffs are a matter of national security.

romanhn2• 1 year ago

Really curious what modern North Korean cinema is like, especially compared to the slick South Korean productions. One of my favorite childhood movies growing up in late 80s Soviet Union was Hong Kil Dong, a campy North Korean martial arts movie, with a folk hero battling evil ninjas. Played across Eastern European movie theaters. Rewatching it as an adult, I was surprised how little propaganda there was in it. According to Wikipedia, the creators were inspired by Shin Sang Ok, the kidnapped director (other sources say he was directly involved - https://youtu.be/lroqzeyPVs0?si=A8yh0hNl0-d2QGgR).

grakasja3• 1 year ago

"Who's that avenger with a flute? He's sticking up for poor people!"

m000• 1 year ago

I was surprised how little propaganda there was in it.

Compared to?

romanhn2• 1 year ago

Compared to what I would expect from North Korean media

emmelaich• 1 year ago

Full movie on youtube.

This moment where baby monster bites a sword is epic: https://youtu.be/MHV-UOdBek0?t=1647

jongjong3• 1 year ago

It's actually quite profound, politically speaking. I understand why Kim Jong Il thought it was a Masterpiece. To get hung up on visuals and call it a knockoff is itself tacky and shows a lack of appreciation for context; which is what art is about. It's an honest take on modern human society and the tradeoffs that are made.

It gives insights into the minds of some modern leaders... The idea that you have to kill the monster which saved you.

The part at the very end where the woman kills the monster and sacrifices herself with it (out of principle) is brilliant. At the end, the soul of the monster joins with the body of the woman and the camera zooms in on her face... You assume that it will bring her back to life but actually, she is not moving and you can't quite tell if her eyes are open or closed (dead or alive)? There's something deep behind the ambiguity.

I suspect Kim Jong Il saw the monster as a metaphor for capitalism or globalization, the woman as a metaphor for a revolutionary leader (maybe Kim himself) and the monster's relentless hunger for metals as a metaphor for greed-driven industrialization but I wonder to what extent did he see it as a metaphor for his own communist movement? The message seems to be that even though she did a bad thing killing their saviour, she did it with sound morals because she was willing to sacrifice herself. She knew it was the right thing to do to contain the monster's relentless greed. But I feel like the part at the very end where the soul of the monster joins her body is a way to show that she is forgiven because it's the intent that counts... Maybe a subtle hint that a good leader is rewarded for having good intentions and conviction but is it purely an ideological reward of being spiritually 'made whole' or also material (she gets to live)?

It makes me wonder if Kim Jong Il may have been tempted to turn North Korea into a capitalist society under the thumb of globalists; keep feeding the beast which had originally (in his view) freed his people from past oppression but instead, he decided to politically 'sacrifice himself' for his people by betraying that globalist monster which had helped him.

There is a statement at the end which essentially amounts to blasphemy in the west: "To keep feeding him, we will have to keep sending him to other countries to wage war. We cannot do this to the world." Ouch.

As unfree and poor as North Korea may be, this is an incredibly blunt, honest take.

lwo32k• 1 year ago

More like people have limitations and there are complex problems they can't solve because of those limitations. Therefore any attempt creates new problems.

So they make up Stories to justify their actions and shift focus away from the costs.

Some people buy the stories. Some people don't. Because with complex problems its like the Universe is in Superposition. The wave function can't collapse. Stability is maintained through incoherence.

Tale as old time.

Older you get there are better things to do than spend time watching people attempt things way above their pay grade.

jongjong3• 1 year ago

Makes sense. It's hard to imagine this for people who don't have access to such opportunities. Myself included to some extent.

Most people will never have to make any truly difficult or impactful ideological decision in their entire lives. Probably couldn't even wrap their minds around it so they're sure to neglect it. The decisions most people encounter in their lives are relatively simple and the consequences of making a mistake are relatively minimal. I feel like the biggest variables in most peoples' lives are external (costs imposed on them), not consequences of their own decisions. It's seems like the flip side of the fact that a small number of people do get to make those impactful decisions on a large scale.

grey-area3• 1 year ago

Please stop excusing and implicitly praising a murderous dictator.

dmos622• 1 year ago

How do you interpret what parent said as an excuse for anyone?

ramblerman• 1 year ago

shows a lack of appreciation for context; which is what art is about

Art is not about context. I'd argue the contrary - Art that needs context is usually crap. You see it a lot in the form of "This painting is special because the painter was ...".

From a psychological perspective I agree, there is a lot of interesting stuff to unpack. But that doesn't make it good art.

aussieguy1234• 1 year ago

For anyone concerned about accidentally hiring a fake NK remote worker, just ask if Kim Jong Un is fat during the interview.

Typically, they will end the call immediately.

grakasja3• 1 year ago

It's actually debated whether the director was "kidnapped". Lots of people in Korea believe he went willingly.

His left-wing films had been banned in the South, and Kim Jong-il offered him superstardom, big budgets and creative control. North Korea was not as bad back then, relatively speaking. Its economy still enjoyed support from both China and the USSR and it could trade with the entire Eastern bloc. South Korea was also a dictatorial military regime at the time (didn't get democracy until 1980s), and lots of South Koreans and Koreans in Japan actually moved to the North in the 60s and 70s. Shin was also generously allowed to "escape" with his family at a film festival after he and Kim ran into creative differences.

On another note Pulgasari is an interesting film because it contains a coded criticism of the Kim regime at the end.

rat87• 1 year ago

This seems incredibly unlikely https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abduction_of_Shin_Sang-ok_an...

To defend themselves should they ever escape North Korea, Choi and Shin decided to sneak in a tape recorder to their conversations with Kim Jong Il so they would have proof that they did not willingly leave the South. In one conversation recorded on October 19, 1983, Kim spoke openly about his plot to kidnap Shin and Choi to upgrade North Korea's film industry. He told Shin and Choi that it would be best if they spoke to the press saying that they came to North Korea voluntarily.[3] Shin and Choi attended a press conference on April 12, 1984, in Belgrade, Yugoslavia where they said they were in North Korea by their own choosing.

grakasja3• 1 year ago

Their re-defection in Vienna seems extremely unlikely. The tape doesn't actually say that they were kidnapped from Hong Kong, that's the summary of a Wikipedia editor. Shin later said that if he had been blocked from making films in the 60s he would have gone to the North voluntarily. We only have his version of the story after he left NK, and the NK government version which are both going to be biased. The truth could be somewhere in the middle e.g. he was lured for a visit or talks and then kept against his will when he changed his mind.

roydivision• 1 year ago

Paul Fischer's book, 'A Kim Jong-Il Production' is well worth a read, not only for the story of these kidnappings, but of life in North Korea and its history.

ultrasandwich• 1 year ago

A friend of mine created a graphic novel about this, called "Madame Choi and the Monsters", if you're interested in that kind of thing.

https://www.abramsbooks.com/product/madame-choi-and-the-mons...

How Kim Jong Il Kidnapped a Director, Made a Cult Hit Godzilla Knockoff (2015)

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