LOOKING FOR NORTH KOREANS
Jéro Yun | South Korea, China, France 2012 | 61 Min. | OmeU
After a short period of pacification, from the end of the 90’s to 2008, the antagonism between North and South Korea flared up again and hopes of reunification seem to have vanished. The cold war between both states is expressed in intense propaganda to discredit the other side, and a censorship policy that forbids the population of one state to access information from the other.
South Korean artist and filmmaker, Jéro Yun chooses not to obey these rules of rejection and non-communication. He sets out Looking for North Koreans who live illegally in Northeast China. To meet them himself, with no filter, and hear what they have to say. His quest leads him to Shanghai, Tsingtao, and Dandong in China. Along his journey, risking his own life, and hiding from the Chinese police, he meets North Korean refugees who agree to tell him their heartbreaking stories.
Looking for North Koreans is about a revelation: people Jéro Yun had been taught to consider as enemies by his parents, schoolbooks, and South Korean media are very similar to members of his own family, his friends or neighbors. North Koreans are in fact not so different from their “brother enemies” in the South.
