Director's Cut
Paul Fischer, A Kim Jong-Il Production: The Extraordinary True Story of a Kidnapped Filmmaker, His Star Actress, and a Young Dictator's Rise to Power
Viking, 368pp, £14.99, ISBN 9780241004302
reviewed by Stephen Lee Naish
It is no coincidence that North Korea seems to exist as an almost real-time movie. The country comes across in weird combination of gangster films like The Godfather, and Once Upon a Time in America, and the old science fiction adaptations of 1984 and Brave New World, played out over a seventy year period with no end credits in sight. The Kim dynasty, thus far including Kim Il-sung, his son Kim Jong-Il, and since 2011, Jong-il's young son Kim Jong-un, are the main stars of the picture, prima donnas in the old Hollywood tradition, with every other North Korean citizen playing a supporting role to the egotistical narrative. It's the most elaborate and most expensive movie in history and it's still in production. Unfortunately the consequence of the Kim’s absolute power is a very real devastation. Whilst the elite reside in the relative wealth and comfort of North Korea's capital city, Pyongyang, the 'extras' are left to fester in the abandoned sound stages of the country's poorer districts, rundown satellite cities and derelict countryside.
Films were an early obsession of the country's second generation dictator Kim Jong-Il. Perhaps his real passion in life was to become a truly great movie director, in effect he achieved this ambition tenfold, directing an entire nation, not on celluloid, but in his own reality. According to Paul Fischer's book, A Kim Jong-Il Production, ‘He was the writer, director, and producer of the nation. He conceived his people's roles, their devotion, their values; he wrote their dialogue and forced it upon them; he mapped out their entire character arcs, from birth to death, splicing them out of the picture if they broke type.’ In any other life, and with any other materials he'd have been called an auteur, instead we know him, and his clan as monsters.
Whilst securing his position in North Korea's elite structure, Kim Jong-il's first official position was leading North Korea's Ministry of Propaganda which incorporated the country's budding film production, that was ultimately used to promote the country's own brand of communist ideology, Juche (translated as self-reliance), and the elevation of his father Kim-Il-sung to eternal godlike status. Jong-il even authored a filmmaking manifesto entitled The Art of Cinema, a classic of North Korean literature; part gibberish, part genius. Yet the film productions that the North Korean's were churning out might have impressed and pushed the ideology on a domestic and, let's face it, captive audience, but the aesthetics were stale. Kim Jong-il was well aware of this, and his obsession with gaining international recognition for artistic achievement led him to partake in an act of espionage worthy of a James Bond thriller.
Fischer's excellent work tells the familiar and tragic consequences of the Korean War, and the dividing of the nation into two opposing factions, the Soviet-backed North and the American backed South. Rather than depicting the events in some hard boiled manner worthy of a cold war thriller, Fischer instead lays out these dramas from the perspective of South Korea's most revered actress and director, Choi Eun-Hee and the hotshot filmmaker Shin San-Ok. When the dust had settled on the Korean peninsula these two would team up as a potent creative force in South Korean cinema, and also become husband and wife. Their fame was such that even the South's own dictatorial president, General Park Chung-Hee, who had swept to power in a military coup d'état in 1961, wooed them to his cause. Choi and Shin were Angelina and Brad before the concept of a power hungry transmedia duo was ever dreamed up. The rise, fall, rise and fall of Shin show that as an artist director he was as megalomaniacal, and equally as talented as Hollywood's James Cameron. Shin's directorial credits are impressive. When Shin fell out of favour with the South Korean censors, and his relationship with Choi Eun-Hee deteriorated, he travelled the world trying to scrap together a film project.
Unknown to Shin at the time his now ex-wife Choi was already residing in relative luxury in North Korea, victim of a horrific kidnapping plot, and now a ‘guest’ of Kim Jong-il who was awaiting Shin’s arrival and the reunification of a filmic powerhouse couple. When Shin did arrive it was by force, another brutal kidnapping with the offer of relative luxury. Unlike Choi, Shin decided a life in the North was not for him, he tried to escape a number of times, once Shin almost made it to the Chinese border, an escapade that with Fischer's fluid writing almost makes the reader believe he’ll make it. Shin was recaptured a mere ten miles from the border and his punishment was exile to the notorious North Korea prison system. Shin spent a number of years in appalling conditions, being virtually starved to death, forced to sit in discomfort for sixteen hours a day, until eventually he began to realise working with the North was his only option other than to die miserable. When Shin and Choi agree to lead the North Korean film units in attaining artistic merit the ruse also becomes a practice in earning the trust of Kim Jong-il, and the various cast of 'minders' who shadow the pair constantly. Only with acute timing is an escape from their captors attempted, when they know that they will be successful.
One can’t help but sense that the whole of Kim Jong-il’s life was shaped by the movies. As he was the only citizen of North Korea allowed the privilege of viewing Western films, one might assume his entire persona was built from countless Hollywood movie archetypes, familiar to him yet utterly original to everybody else in the country. There are scenes within Fischer’s book which bear striking similarities to classic moments of western cinema. Take for example the chaotic parties thrown by Kim and his entourage. An obvious association would be Entourage, the television show that follows a spoilt Hollywood star and his group of debauched childhood friends as they spend, drink, snort and fuck their way through Los Angeles. However the belittling nature of Kim Jong-Il towards his party guests instantly makes the reader think of Joe Pesci’s maniacal Tommy DeVito from Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas, the rotten hood that for his own amusement makes the teenage bartender spider-dance by firing his gun at his feet, eventually killing him. This is prime Kim Jong-il, though in this reality he's making everyone dance to his tune.
There can be no doubt that Shin and Choi suffered great hardships under the watchful eye of the North Korean state, Shin imprisoned for years, Choi unaware of why she was brought to North Korea, both taken from their friends and families. Eventually though they lived in relative comfort, headed up a film production company that placed artistic merit over ideological own goals, able to travel outside of the country (with minders in tow) and screen their films at prestigious international film festivals, and most importantly they had a direct line of contact with Kim Jong-il.
Fischer's book reads like a classic Hollywood tragedy, though in this case the protagonists are not the centre point of the tragic events that take place. In this situation the tragedy befalls the 'extras', the people of North Korea who are subjected to the ‘deluded self narrative’ and the absolute control of the Kim regime. Hooked up to a constant drip-feed of propaganda which tells them from almost the day they are born that they have nothing to envy of the outside world; that the workers’ paradise created by the Kim dynasty provides everything they will ever need. Hollywood is often called the 'Dream Factory,’ and it certainly provides often unattainable feats of the imagination, yet aspiration is also to be found in Hollywood films. The North Korean model of film production is to crush aspiration; to never allow its people to prosper; a factory whose sole intention is to produce only nightmares.
Films were an early obsession of the country's second generation dictator Kim Jong-Il. Perhaps his real passion in life was to become a truly great movie director, in effect he achieved this ambition tenfold, directing an entire nation, not on celluloid, but in his own reality. According to Paul Fischer's book, A Kim Jong-Il Production, ‘He was the writer, director, and producer of the nation. He conceived his people's roles, their devotion, their values; he wrote their dialogue and forced it upon them; he mapped out their entire character arcs, from birth to death, splicing them out of the picture if they broke type.’ In any other life, and with any other materials he'd have been called an auteur, instead we know him, and his clan as monsters.
Whilst securing his position in North Korea's elite structure, Kim Jong-il's first official position was leading North Korea's Ministry of Propaganda which incorporated the country's budding film production, that was ultimately used to promote the country's own brand of communist ideology, Juche (translated as self-reliance), and the elevation of his father Kim-Il-sung to eternal godlike status. Jong-il even authored a filmmaking manifesto entitled The Art of Cinema, a classic of North Korean literature; part gibberish, part genius. Yet the film productions that the North Korean's were churning out might have impressed and pushed the ideology on a domestic and, let's face it, captive audience, but the aesthetics were stale. Kim Jong-il was well aware of this, and his obsession with gaining international recognition for artistic achievement led him to partake in an act of espionage worthy of a James Bond thriller.
Fischer's excellent work tells the familiar and tragic consequences of the Korean War, and the dividing of the nation into two opposing factions, the Soviet-backed North and the American backed South. Rather than depicting the events in some hard boiled manner worthy of a cold war thriller, Fischer instead lays out these dramas from the perspective of South Korea's most revered actress and director, Choi Eun-Hee and the hotshot filmmaker Shin San-Ok. When the dust had settled on the Korean peninsula these two would team up as a potent creative force in South Korean cinema, and also become husband and wife. Their fame was such that even the South's own dictatorial president, General Park Chung-Hee, who had swept to power in a military coup d'état in 1961, wooed them to his cause. Choi and Shin were Angelina and Brad before the concept of a power hungry transmedia duo was ever dreamed up. The rise, fall, rise and fall of Shin show that as an artist director he was as megalomaniacal, and equally as talented as Hollywood's James Cameron. Shin's directorial credits are impressive. When Shin fell out of favour with the South Korean censors, and his relationship with Choi Eun-Hee deteriorated, he travelled the world trying to scrap together a film project.
Unknown to Shin at the time his now ex-wife Choi was already residing in relative luxury in North Korea, victim of a horrific kidnapping plot, and now a ‘guest’ of Kim Jong-il who was awaiting Shin’s arrival and the reunification of a filmic powerhouse couple. When Shin did arrive it was by force, another brutal kidnapping with the offer of relative luxury. Unlike Choi, Shin decided a life in the North was not for him, he tried to escape a number of times, once Shin almost made it to the Chinese border, an escapade that with Fischer's fluid writing almost makes the reader believe he’ll make it. Shin was recaptured a mere ten miles from the border and his punishment was exile to the notorious North Korea prison system. Shin spent a number of years in appalling conditions, being virtually starved to death, forced to sit in discomfort for sixteen hours a day, until eventually he began to realise working with the North was his only option other than to die miserable. When Shin and Choi agree to lead the North Korean film units in attaining artistic merit the ruse also becomes a practice in earning the trust of Kim Jong-il, and the various cast of 'minders' who shadow the pair constantly. Only with acute timing is an escape from their captors attempted, when they know that they will be successful.
One can’t help but sense that the whole of Kim Jong-il’s life was shaped by the movies. As he was the only citizen of North Korea allowed the privilege of viewing Western films, one might assume his entire persona was built from countless Hollywood movie archetypes, familiar to him yet utterly original to everybody else in the country. There are scenes within Fischer’s book which bear striking similarities to classic moments of western cinema. Take for example the chaotic parties thrown by Kim and his entourage. An obvious association would be Entourage, the television show that follows a spoilt Hollywood star and his group of debauched childhood friends as they spend, drink, snort and fuck their way through Los Angeles. However the belittling nature of Kim Jong-Il towards his party guests instantly makes the reader think of Joe Pesci’s maniacal Tommy DeVito from Martin Scorsese's Goodfellas, the rotten hood that for his own amusement makes the teenage bartender spider-dance by firing his gun at his feet, eventually killing him. This is prime Kim Jong-il, though in this reality he's making everyone dance to his tune.
There can be no doubt that Shin and Choi suffered great hardships under the watchful eye of the North Korean state, Shin imprisoned for years, Choi unaware of why she was brought to North Korea, both taken from their friends and families. Eventually though they lived in relative comfort, headed up a film production company that placed artistic merit over ideological own goals, able to travel outside of the country (with minders in tow) and screen their films at prestigious international film festivals, and most importantly they had a direct line of contact with Kim Jong-il.
Fischer's book reads like a classic Hollywood tragedy, though in this case the protagonists are not the centre point of the tragic events that take place. In this situation the tragedy befalls the 'extras', the people of North Korea who are subjected to the ‘deluded self narrative’ and the absolute control of the Kim regime. Hooked up to a constant drip-feed of propaganda which tells them from almost the day they are born that they have nothing to envy of the outside world; that the workers’ paradise created by the Kim dynasty provides everything they will ever need. Hollywood is often called the 'Dream Factory,’ and it certainly provides often unattainable feats of the imagination, yet aspiration is also to be found in Hollywood films. The North Korean model of film production is to crush aspiration; to never allow its people to prosper; a factory whose sole intention is to produce only nightmares.