Asian Addicts Anonymous

Over the past three afternoons, I’ve been watching “Kimjongilia“, which I taped off of the Documentary Channel. (I would have watched it all in one setting, but it kept getting interrupted by my having to go to work.) Because I taped it off of the TV, I don’t have any screen shots. But here’s a review, anyway!

“Kimjongilia” is a documentary on North Korea. I’m rather into anything about North Korea, honestly. It’s like all the insanity of tales of the Russian gulags, but without that pesky Russian insistence to interrupt every train of thought with hundreds of pages of banal commentary on, like, farming. And, sure, I could read up on the Cultural Revolution of China and get something close to the same vibe, but… Well, North Korea is current, which makes it very raw and new – and it really has its own special variety of mind-blowing craziness.

The bad parts of “Kimjongilia”:

Awkward camera angles!
Example: In an attempt to hide the identity of one of the interviewees, the camera zooms in on her face. It zooms in a lot. A whole friggin’ lot. Huge portions of her narrative reveal an over-sized image of her teeth and mouth.  This probably shouldn’t distract from the story she’s telling, but… Honestly? …It really does.

Slow and patchy story telling!
Example: At one point, the guy who I believe is the author of “The Aquariums of Pyongyang” is being interviewed, and without the context of his full story, or the context of the book, what he’s saying seems very haphazard and random. It’s annoying because I know he’s got more to say!

Bad b-roll!
Example: I think “b-roll” is what they call the footage shown in-between shots of the people being interviewed, right? Well, this documentary has a lot of b-roll, and most of it is rather awful. …Most of it centers around a modern dance ballerina chick twisting and turning in either the outfit of a North Korean traffic lady, a hanbok, or a military uniform. Sometimes she manages to add some stunning displays to provide a backdrop to the narration, but mostly she’s just insanely annoying.

If you’ve read anything on North Korea, some of this is very repetitive!
Example: One girl’s story sounds, for a time, rather a bit like part of “Jia“. …Which isn’t to say that her story isn’t interesting or truthful, it’s just… strangely familiar. A lot of these stories are strangely familiar. If you’ve delved into anything about North Korea previously, expect to reflectively run through a list of book titles in your head while you’re watching this.

The good parts of “Kimjongilia”:

The interviews get very good, eventually!
Example: About halfway through, there’s a military guy who suddenly whips out this insanely impressive recount of how he and his family escaped from the North to get to the South. Like, up until that point, the stories were sort’ve strange and oddly paced, but this guy seriously ups the level of what’s going on in this documentary. …I’d almost say it’s worth watching this thing just to hear this guy’s tale.

North Korean media!
Example: They have clips from North Korean movies in this thing! There’s even a part where these girls are gaily tromping through the countryside, singing about the abundant amounts of food available there, and how beautiful the women are. It was just fascinating to see how Disneyesque their propaganda is!

Intensely synchronized everything!
Example: I’ve seen images and clips from North Korean military parades and the Arirang Festival, but none of that prepared me for the women marching past the camera. I can’t even describe how epic their footwork is…

There’s a pretty neat time line sequence!
Example: Well, the time line sequence is the example for the time line sequence, I guess. It looks like a roller coaster. I don’t know why I found that as satisfying as I did, but it made me very, very happy. It did not, however, provide me with much new information, and served to reemphasize how little I understand Kim Il-sung’s rise to power. …But I’m still counting it as a positive due to the hypnotic roller coaster graphics.

So, in the end, is “Kimjongilia” good or bad?

Well, I really love anything I can get my hands on about the country: websites, books, and documentaries. So my own personal bias is for “Kimjongilia”, simply because it scratches a constant itch I have to learn about North Korea.

But I think I’d recommend it because of the movie clips, the examples of the military marches and synchronized dances, and the occasional glimpse offered into what’s going on over there.

Mostly, though, I’d recommend it for the stories from the second half of the documentary. …That military guy escaping with this family? That guy alone makes this worth watching.