Son Of Sung
My kids mark time by the release dates of Harry Potter flicks. One of my daughters knows the “Pirates of the Caribbean” production details and the due date of the second sequel, still several years out. They talk about the actors, who’s in, who’s out in the next one. I feel a little left out in those dinner table conversations, without much to contribute. No more.
Pyongyangwood, or whatever they call the film hub of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, is working on “The Sun of Songun Shedding Its Rays All over the World,” an epic serial blockbuster about the life of Kim Jong Il. It’s been no ordinary life and it will be no ordinary movie.
(I’m calling it “Son of Sung” for short. It just sounds better. More marketable, if you ask me. Which they didn’t.)
Here’s the UK Independent:
His birth was marked by a double rainbow and a new star, he hit 11 holes-in-one in his first game of golf, finishing 38 under par, and throughout his life he has performed heroic feats impossible for mere mortals. When he shouts, “huge storms happen”.
(That’s good, “huge storms happen.” A little grandiose, slightly awkward sounding, but the Nork scribblers are working it, not just falling back on easy cliches like ”heads roll.”)
The life of North Korea’s ailing leader, Kim Jong-il, has long been extravagantly window-dressed by the state’s diligent chroniclers, but now it is about to get the full regal treatment with a new movie chronicling his exploits from childhood to living legend.
North Korea’s state media said this week that the first part of a multi-series documentary about Mr Kim’s birth, childhood and early achievements, when he developed “military ideas and theories and tactics of [his father] President Kim Il-sung”, has already been produced. Although other propaganda movies extol Mr Kim’s boundless virtues – one records that he came down from the heavens accompanied by a huge snowstorm – this will be the first to “comprehensively deal… with his revolutionary exploits”, said the Korean Central News Agency.
…
Mr Kim inherited an intense cult of personality from his father, known as the Great Leader, who was also the subject of an official 20-part retrospective biopic in the last year of his life.
I’m going to need to get all versed up on that, so I can drop facts in an offhand way the next time the kids about bring up ”Transformers” at dinner. DPRK News is probably a place to good start, but first, in other Kim Jong Il film news, there’s the dread unauthorized biopic that every bonafide mega-phenom loves to hate, maybe sues over, the one that confirms überstardom. Here’s TIME magazine re the critical new Kim flick, “Kimjongilia.”
Just when North Korea couldn’t possibly provoke more condemnation, along comes Kimjongilia to pile it on.
Documentarian Nancy Heikin just wanted to see Japan with her husband, who was attending a human-rights conference, but ended up spending seven years recording the testimony of escapees from the brutal Pyongyang regime. To be seen at October’s Pusan International Film Festival and released in South Korea afterward, Kimjongilia — the title is taken from the name of a begonia cultivated in honor of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il — is a harrowing night at the movies.
But there may be too much flowery elaboration here, too, leaving this real-life horror film with ethical questions that linger as much as the North’s rotten scent. While some of the subjects have reason to desire anonymity, most are filmed jerkily at such an unnaturally close range — a teary eye here, trembling lips there — that viewers cannot assess the whole of their humanity or believability. In order to “let emotions resonate,” says the filmmaker, she intercut interpretive dancers in Korean garb with scenes of barbed wire and chilling landscapes. Playing off kitsch paeans to North Korea’s Dear Leader, Heikin adds, “the whole film sort of went operatic.”
I dunno. Sounds like pretty hardcore Juche realism to me. Hard to top “Team America: World Police” in the Kim Jong film genre, but I’d watch that. TIME agonizes …
Similar difficulties have arisen ever since Michael Moore and Errol Morris popularized documentary by stretching its boundaries. Can manipulation of truth best be exposed through manipulation of emotions? Do humanitarian ends justify all cinematic means? Asian audiences will have to decide for themselves if propaganda is best countered by playing it straight.
Hot damn, that’s it! Michael Moore as producer of the epic “Son of Sung” propumentary. Sheer genius, if I say so myself. I just blew myself away with that one. I wonder if Kim’s thought of it yet. He’s pretty film savvy. So what if they’ve already made the first one. An epic series is a chance to bring all the greats in, mix it up. He’s already a master of cinema unverite. It’d be fascinating to see how Moore adapts film nork conventions.
OK, here’s KCNA:
Pyongyang, July 15 (KCNA) — “I Will Add Glory to Korea,” Part 1 of documentary film “The Sun of Songun Shedding Its Rays All over the World” has been produced by the Korean Documentary and Science Film Studio.
The multi-part documentary film will comprehensively deal with the immortal Songun revolutionary exploits performed by General Secretary Kim Jong Il for the country and the revolution, the times and humankind with his extraordinary wisdom and distinguished leadership art, political caliber and noble personality.
The part 1 of the film tells about the historical facts that Kim Jong Il, born as a son of the legendary guerrillas in Mt. Paektu, the holy mountain of revolution, on February 16, Juche 31 (1942), grew to be a great successor to the revolutionary cause of Juche amid the tempest of revolution and made a firm determination to make the country shed its rays all over the world with arms.
It contains impressive scenes telling that Kim Jong Il established a Juche-based outlook on army on the basis of his experience gained in the grim periods of the great anti-Japanese war, the building of a new country, the Fatherland Liberation War and the postwar rehabilitation and construction and acquired the perfect personality and qualification to be possessed by a leader.
The film tells about the undying feats Kim Jong Il performed by firmly preparing students in military aspects and synthesizing and systematizing the original military ideas and theories and tactics of President Kim Il Sung and thus consolidated the ideological and theoretical foundation of Songun leadership, while conducting his revolutionary activities at Kim Il Sung University.
It emphasizes that the solemn oath taken by Kim Jong Il in those days of history will go down forever with the glorious history of Korea, the revolutionary history of Songun.
You know, if it wasn’t for the climate of fear, the constant threat of death, the repetitious subject matter, sparse rations, all that, working at the DPRK News and coming up with creative new ways to warble about Kim could be a literary blast rivaled only by the Jacko beat at any given tabloid. Not quite as good as the Bat Boy and alien beat at the Weekly World News, of course, but what is? Now that I think of it, climates of fear, constant threats of death, repetitious subject matter and sparse rations may not be that far removed from the free-world newspaper norm these days.
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:21 pm on Thursday, July 16, 2009
4 Responses to “Son Of Sung”
Leave a Reply
Trackback URLYou must be logged in to post a comment.
July 16th, 2009 at 10:55 pm
Mr Kim inherited an intense cult of personality from his father, known as the Great Leader, who was also the subject of an official 20-part retrospective biopic in the last year of his life.
This is the part that intrigues me. Dare we hope?
July 17th, 2009 at 9:44 am
[...] an epic serial blockbuster about the life of Kim Jong Il.” From The Independent (U.K.): [...]
July 17th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
I guess a lot of MSM outlets like Newsweek must outsource some of their Obama reporting to the KCNA. “(modern Perry White equivalent: “Hey, kid, let these guys show you how to do a real hagiography! If you could write half as good as them you’d make Senior Editor in no time!”)
July 28th, 2009 at 2:59 am
A first sequel would be “part 2,” and a second sequel would be “part 3.” Considering that there have already been three “Pirates” movies released (er, we are still in 2009, right?), one would properly say the next movie would be the third sequel.
Not to mention all the Potter books are now out.
Probably not high on your list of “things to know,” no doubt. :)
I just can’t get a certain tune out of my head: Neal Diamond singing Son Sung Blues…