Submit Podcast or Channel

Sun Kim on documenting North Korean women, matchmaking and marriage

September 2, 20260 comments♥ 0
00:00 When North Korea moves, you need more than headlines. NKPro's Intel Suite brings together real-time trackers, expert analysis, primary source databases and KCNA watch, giving professionals a faster, clearer view of developments across the DPRK. From missile launches and maritime activity to leadership movements, sanctions, trade and state media, NKPro helps government, security, finance, research and media teams connect the dots before their next briefing. NKPro, the intelligence layer for serious North Korea work.
00:39 Hello and welcome back to the NK News podcast. I'm your host, Alanna Hill, and it is Thursday, August 27th. Today, we're looking at North Korea through a rather unusual lens, dating, marriage, and what happens when people from the two Koreas try to build lives together. The documentary, North-South man-woman, follows Eugen Han, a North Korean defector who runs a matchmaking agency connecting North Korean refugee women with South Korean men. Filmed over five years, it looks at relationships, resettlement
01:28 and the social divide between the two Koreas through the lives of Eugene and the couples around her. The film premiered internationally at Sheffield Dockfest last year and is now making its Korean festival debut at the EBS International Documentary Festival where it is screening at the Seoul Film Centre. One of its co-directors, Sun Kim, has actually been on the NK News podcast before, alongside her long-time collaborator, Morton Travick, to introduce the documentary and talk about its five-year production. But with the film now, coming home to Korea, I wanted to bring Son back for a deeper conversation about the people behind it, what she learned while making it, and what the story says about relations between North and South Koreans today.
02:11 Son, welcome back to the NK News podcast. Thank you for having me. So, Sun, when you last on the podcast with Morton, you talked quite a bit about the film itself and the five-year process of making it. But I want to go back even further today and ask you, how did you personally first become involved in this project? So Morton and I had met in 2012, and we worked on several projects together that Morton was leading, mostly theatre projects, between 2013 and 15. And of course, the last project that we worked on together was LIBAC's concert in North Korea. And LIBAC is, for those of us who, for those people who are not so familiar with them, they are an industrial art band from Slovenia.
03:00 And so staging their concert in North Korea and making that into a documentary was the last project that we worked on. And of course, with the travel ban of U.S. citizens to North Korea, in 2017, I stopped working on a lot of projects that were directly happening in North Korea. And it wasn't until maybe 2018, like late in 2018, that Morton approached me and said he had read an article in The Guardian about matchmakers in South Korea who were matching northern women with southern men. And he said, I think this could be a, you know, good idea to pursue. and he asked me if I wouldn't go and meet Eugene,
03:43 who he had already tracked down, but not quite conveyed or gotten her consent to work on a documentary. So that's how it started. Well, actually, there's something about your relationship with Morton that I read, and I immediately knew that I had to ask you about because apparently you first two met at a rest stop somewhere between Pyongyang and the DMZ back in 2012. I mean, this in itself, it sounds like the opening of a movie.
04:09 So what actually happened on that day? So I was there with a group from Columbia University, the SEPA school, graduate school, students in international relations. Morton was there with a Norwegian group celebrating, I think, the Norwegian National Day in North Korea. And, of course, all of the groups that are heading to the DMZ all stop at this rest stop. And my group and his group was stopped there. And we met, I think, at one of the stands where, you know, they were selling apples and cigarettes and, you know, North Korean souvenirs. And we exchanged cards. I think he thought I was, he wasn't sure who I was, but he heard me speak both Korean and English.
04:51 And he said, I haven't heard someone do that quite properly like you and we should stay in touch. And so around that time, I moved from the States to Belgium. And that's how we started working more on these European projects together. It's such a fascinating and chance encounter. And as you mentioned, And since then, you've somehow ended up working together for more than a decade, including on the film we're discussing today, North-South man-woman. What do you think kept bringing you back together creatively? I think for me, the fact that Morton was working on cultural exchange projects is what attracted me to the projects that he was working on.
05:31 There have, of course, been a lot of political projects. And I just found it very interesting to see culturally or artistically, what kind of collaboration is possible. And a lot of times we worked with children or music. And it was just really nice to understand, you know, how children with a certain talent, how people with a certain talent, artistic talent, can come out from their different corners of the world and connect. And what are the limitations of that as well? And so I think to be a bridge between those two sides and really intimately work with that for me was really a period of growth. I mean, I had throughout the years studied Korean literature, both, you know, after liberation,
06:18 but also before liberation. And so just to see how the language has changed, for instance, post-liberation in real life, you know, to hear a lot of northerners speaking, you know, to hear what their slang was at that time and just be very close to that. it was just really expand in my understanding of the Korean language as well. Well, this leads me perfectly into my next question because I want to ask you a bit more about your background. It's quite interesting. You were born and educated in the US and you've lived in Seoul and as you mentioned, you're now based in Belgium. And for years, you also worked as a
06:52 cultural mediator on, as you said, Morton's projects involving North Korea. Actually, I was listening to the last podcast you were on with Jaco and Morton mentioned how you're a tri-cultural background was basically essential for establishing the necessary level of personal relations, essential for this kind of film that you made. So on, do you think that you're slightly, I want to say maybe in between perspective, is part of why maybe you gravitated towards stories about the Korean divide? Yes, I do. I think for me, I really found it interesting. First of all, I think this divide that actually is there. I mean, of course, the Irish have this as well, right?
07:36 I mean, this cultural, political, historical background behind this divide, I think I find it very interesting. And this really tragic situation where people are divided also quite interesting. And so I think I, yes, I'm absolutely attracted to, let's say, northerners here in the south, because they are in some ways immigrants. They are people who are in movement in transit. And I myself having moved between, let's say, the U.S. and South Korea, and at a late age, having immigrated also to Belgium, I really, I think, understood in an intimate way how difficult that can be learning or trying to adapt or integrate into a new culture, trying to pass, you know, so to speak as a certain kind of person.
08:27 I think this understanding that within myself and seeing that in the Northerners really helped me understand how difficult it could be for them. It's such an interesting perspective and so relevant to this film because so much of it is about people trying to navigate, as you said, different identities and different versions of Korea. I think that brings me naturally to Yujin. herself. So when you and Morton were previously on the podcast, we heard quite a bit about Eugene and the matchmaking agency that she runs. But I'm curious about how you came to the decision
09:01 to base the entire film around her. You know, funnily enough, I don't know if listeners will be surprised to hear this, but she isn't the only person running this kind of agency that matches North Koreans with South Koreans in South Korea. What was it about Eugene that made you think this is the person that we want to follow? And ultimately spent five years of your life filming her? So when we first read, when we encountered this article from The Guardian, there were several matchmakers that were featured in that article. And when I came to Korea to meet Eugene for the first time on my own, I met with her,
09:38 but I met with all of them. And I spoke with each of them. And I tried to gauge, you know, who was most open to it. Maybe I thought, we thought even, we were open to the possibility that maybe several matchmaking. might be interested in this project. And what we found was that a lot of the matchmakers were quite reluctant. I mean, there are, of course, like, privacy issues or whatnot. But they just, I think a lot of Koreans are also used to this idea of making films
10:05 or participating in documentaries that are, you know, on TV. But for instance, being paid to do that. Or just doing it for a couple of days and project is over, right? And so when I explained that our project is going to take years, and we can't pay and that, you know, we will have complete license and artistic freedom over how things are done. Of course, with your permission and respecting your boundaries, there were a lot of people who were just like, no way, not interested. And Eugene was one of the few people, I mean, the only one actually who understood what we were trying to do or who was really intrigued by it. And her perspective was, I have children, and I really want a film like this to change the perception of many people who watch it on how North Koreans are perceived here in South Korea, what it is that we do, what we are really like.
11:00 And she really felt that this might change that. And so initially the idea was to follow Eugene, but really to follow her clients, you know, also her matching people, her matching couples, following them possibly from the beginnings of. of the dating or in the middle of their relationship or at the wedding or post marriage, you know, with the children. And just to see like the process of what happens when Northerners arrive here and what is their happily ever after? How do they find love and how do they build a family again? And so it wasn't initially all about Eugene, but the real turning point for us was COVID.
11:39 And after COVID, it was just really hard for her to find clients. who wanted to be on camera. Everyone was also wearing these masks in Korea. And naturally, when we first came back, we just really had to start again from filming her. We had a basically two-year hiatus in filming. And when we came back in 2021 and 22 to film her, it really was just getting our feet wet again,
12:06 reestablishing the trust and the relationship again. When you're pitching a film like this to someone like Eugene, Do you go in knowing that it will take five years? Do you have a specific time frame in mind? How do you end up with that time frame? When we first started, I don't think anyone thought that it would take that long. I think we really thought that we would come in, maybe shoot for two, three years, maybe maximum. But it was really COVID that changed everything.
12:34 We had started the, I mean, the filming in 2019 summer. And we weren't able to come back until two years later, you know. So I think in between that time and even in 2021 and 22, I think we, you know, at various points did even think, I mean, how do we continue this project? Which direction do we go in? I mean, we no longer have the vision or the ideas that we started with. And so I think just naturally we started to, we just, as we filmed, went with the flow and tried to see where is it growing, where is it opening? and there was, yeah, there was a period where we were not so sure, but we continued to film, and I think continuing, persisting, naturally just opened up the narrative as well. How do you think that your relationship with Eugenna and with the women and the couples
13:27 that you were following changed in those five years? It was very interesting. I feel actually quite grateful and honored that they opened up to me during that time, period. that they continue to open up to me during that time period because each of them their lives changed. I mean, my life changed too. Everyone's lives changed during those five, six years that we were working on the film.
13:52 But Eugene, for instance, goes through a larger change. I don't know if I should spoil it here on the podcast, but we see that she breaks up with her husband and finds new love. Hyuju also, compared to the beginning to the end of filming, like her life also goes through a different trajectory. the friendships, the relationships, the children are growing. And so it was quite interesting to see that change.
14:18 And just to continue to be able to hear their stories, like quite unfiltered, I think was really important to me. And of course, not all of it is in the film. But we did have so much material where they are opening up about where they are currently, like a lot of nitty-gritty details. And I feel honored that they continue to open up with that. I want to ask you another question about how they opened up to you because this film, of course, it's not just about North Koreans coming to South Korea and trying to resettle and find their identities. It's also about a deeply personal issue for everyone, you know, love and intimacy and dating.
14:59 And was there a point when you were filming that as these people were opening up to you where you kind of, they stopped maybe thinking of you primarily as filmmakers, where those boundaries, ever blurred at all? I think absolutely with me. I think when I come in, I mean, a lot of times people, building trust is what I do a lot of times between two different sides. And I think with the Northern women here at least, they saw me really as an, I mean, I spoke Korean. And yet at the same time, they knew that I had been to the North. And I think that was a lot, a large part of where the trust came. This is someone who understands where we come from. and also understands where we are right now. And I think also being outside, not being really
15:46 actively a part of the South Korean community or living here, I think they felt that I was a lot less judgmental or objective. And that was really where a lot of the opening came from. It was almost like, I can open up to this person. I know this information is not going anywhere. I know she's not judging me. And so there was a lot of things that were just pouring out of them. And I was really quite surprised. But again, honored to hold the space for them and hear them and, you know, take some things off their chest. Well, one thing really striking about the film is that it moves between observational footage and interviews and then archival material. Was that structure something that you and Morton had in mind from the beginning?
16:33 Or did the story kind of force you to rethink the film as you went along, of course, over that? course of five years. Initially, we thought that we would like to go to North Korea and shoot there. We thought, wouldn't it be nice if we could find some couples there on the street, dating, interview them, include that footage in there and try to find some couples that are together, or if there's a matchmaker in North Korea, it'd be nice if we could go find them. So we had, of course, all these ideas. And with COVID, again, no travel, you know, nothing happening. And so, again, I think we just followed the narrative where it was going, followed Eugene's life, continued to open that up.
17:15 And I think we followed her life and where it was going just until, I mean, even until the last scene that you see in the film, that we didn't plan to film. We had already edited the film, you know, prior to her, you know, meeting a new person, a new partner. And we essentially decided, okay, let's edit that section back in there. And so over the course of this editing, we thought, okay, what is it that we can show about their, where they come from, that really illuminates, you know, who they are or what their background is. And so this archival footage
17:50 naturally came in there. Let me ask you a bit more about that editing process, because I imagine it must have been very difficult for you in particular, having built trust with these characters, with these women, and having, you know, built trust based on such personal aspects of their lives. Were there any moments where they asked you maybe not to use something they'd filmed or something that they'd said or when you and Morton had to make a difficult editorial decision about whether a scene belonged in the documentary at all? When we started with Eugene, one of the first things that she established was, or that we established with her, was that if there was anything in the film that made her very uncomfortable, you know, something too personal that just crossed a line for her, we said, we want to know and we're
18:37 going to remove that because we don't want to, you know, make life for her difficult. For instance, this is not some kind of disclosure of, you know, you know, how, how things are in a marriage. I mean, it's not just that, right? And we wanted to respect what her boundaries were. Yet, at the same time, we wanted to, you know, expand what she thought was possible as well. So there was a bit of, like, negotiation happening a little bit of, like, she sent, her saying, I really don't like that. But, you know, I think if I can imagine, I've never been in a documentary fully myself as a main character, but I can imagine you would see yourself on camera and be like, oh, I hate that angle of my face or, you know, I don't like how I said that.
19:18 So it's a lot of times it would be talking it out, you know, talking points out and saying, what is it about this that you don't like? Yeah, you're right. That's a really unflattering angle of you. But could we just keep it? Because I don't think everyone thinks that you look unflattering. Or it would be like, what about the concept? content there. The content is okay of what you said and she's like, okay, yeah. And so it would be a lot of
19:38 this. And then there would be some issues where, you know, she would say, I really don't like that. This angle of my family life is in there or this aspect of my family life is in there and that's too sensitive for me. Or it's not just me, it's my children, you know. And so we really worked around certain issues. But in the end, I would say that there were not so many different things that she had issues with. And we really only showed her the film at the end. So mostly we did what we wanted. And then at the end, I think in that last, last edit, a couple of rounds of editing, we included her in there. And I imagine the fact that this did take place over five years, probably played to your favour in some sense in that maybe she got used to hearing herself and seeing herself
20:24 or seeing clips because I'm sure anyone who's heard themselves or seen themselves that first time is so just cringe. You're like, oh, I never want to hear it again or see it again. But you almost become desensitized, I think, after a little while. So I can't imagine after five years. She probably was just so used to you guys. Yeah, yeah. It was kind of funny the first time, first couple times we went to film her, we showed her the footage thinking like, hey, you know, check this out. Just to kind of reassure her that we're doing a good job. And, you know, everyone on the team, at least the production team, most of the DOP, the director of photographers, the editors, you know, Morton, a large part of them are non-Koreanes, of course, they're all Latvians or
21:09 Europeans and men. And she saw some of the first footage that we gave of her, that we shot of her, and she was like, oh my gosh, look at me, I look horrible. Like they shot me at a horrible angle, and I don't look good at that angle. And she's like, don't you have any filters? Like people are using filters in Korea. And I was like, I'm sorry. I was like, we're going to edit it at the end. It's not going to look like this. And yeah, so she had a certain idea of how she should be shot or how Koreans shoot, right?
21:39 I mean, how Koreans use these filters. And so there were certain expectations that had to be broken. But I think towards the end, yes, she understood that, okay, well, you know, they want something more real and nitty-gritty and you're up, okay, so be it. Well, son, after spending five years on this project, was there one moment, that completely changed your understanding of the story that you thought you were telling when you began? Yeah, I think I believed in the beginning that we were going to follow people falling in love or people falling out of love. And I think what we ended up with is in fact the later part of that, right?
22:18 I mean, I thought we would, in the process, if we look at, you know, the process itself, I thought we would be following people in the beginning of that process. and we really jumped in the middle. We got in with the couples that were already together and followed them from there. And so that was quite unexpected. A lot of times when we were writing applications or applying for funding,
22:41 it was really about the first half of the process that we were writing about because that was what we were expecting. And in fact, we ended up with like an aspect of their lives that we didn't really imagine or plan for. And so there was a lot of surprise in that as well for us. I want to see them out a little bit now because one of the things that makes the documentary interesting is that this very small matchmaking business, it opens into so much bigger questions
23:10 about the two careers. On the surface, it's a film about people looking for husbands and wives and love. But underneath that, you're dealing with identity and trauma and gender, class and ultimately national division. How did you think about keeping the... those very, very intimate love stories at the center of the film without allowing the much larger political story to overwhelm them. One thing that Morton and I talked about when we were first starting out was that we did
23:42 not want to make a political film, that this should be really about the characters and that we should follow the characters and how their lives unfold. and if there happens to be some political moment that fits in with it, then it's fine to weave that in. But it was never our intention to make this a politically charged film about the two Koreas. I think already having a northerner and a southerner getting together, how they interact together, that was already to us political enough. And when you watch the beginning of the film,
24:20 There is an incident, a political incident that does happen with another northern woman who tragically dies with her son. And that to us was quite, I mean, that was completely unplanned. And it was one of the first moments that we captured and we thought, okay, that we need to layer in to show how difficult life in the South can be. Here is one Mrs. Han, Eugene, our character, who went one path. And there's another Mrs. Han who went another way. And just to give that, I guess, reality, a reality check to people, like it can go either way, really. It can be that difficult.
25:01 You know, just landing here in South Korea doesn't mean that it's over, you know. So that was important to us. But other than that, I think we really tried not to overwhelm it with political elements and just let the characters, you know, naturally just be themselves. and if there are political moments again, you know, there it is. And just some context for our listeners, of course, the other Mrs. Han that you're referring to is a defector who came to South Korea and very sadly fell off the radar completely of authorities here
25:32 and was found passed away with her young son in her apartment. There's also a particularly interesting contradiction at the heart of Eugene's stories, and you've touched on this already. Her own marriage, of course, is in some ways the advertisement for her business. It's proof that a North Korean woman and a South Korean man can build a life together. And as you said, over the course of the film, this unraveled. What did watching that happen reveal to you about Eugene or perhaps about the idea that she was selling to her clients? When I first met Eugene and in the first several meetings that we had, I knew that there was some trouble there between her and her husband at the time.
26:14 And every couple has this. That's the reality, right? I mean, a relationship is never always good. And she spoke, of course, about how they met, how they got together, and how they got married and had children together. And it was a beautiful love story for her, too. And yet at the same time, there was a lot of dissatisfaction. And there were cultural differences. And there were in-laws and other family members.
26:42 So I think I tried to understand how much of this is, you know, Sun is here, so I'm going to event. And how much of this is, this is a serious problem. And as we continue to film, possibly it might, you know, her marriage might change course. I think we were prepared for both scenarios. But I think that what she really truly did believe was based on the matches that she was making, even if her relationship was not perfect, she really believed and saw through the relationships that she matched that Northerners and Southerners can be really good partners in life. And they can, and a lot of them don't have any issues. And they continue to build really healthy relationships. So I think that was a confidence and that was what she was selling.
27:33 And she was based on her own mistakes, able to guide other women to make better mistakes. right if someone wanted to really rush into a relationship because eugene herself got married really quite quickly if someone wanted to rush into a relationship or if they were going really fast she would maybe be you know play that older sister or auntie or like mother you know from the female side and say wait a minute like are you sure you're really ready for this are you guys really matching properly and so i think based on the mistakes that she made in her own life she really tried to help other women not make those mistakes. And she really saw that as her mission in life. I don't want to spoil the movie too much, but I do want to ask, when it came to the
28:21 breakdown of Eugen's own marriage, how much of it do you think was because of cultural differences between Eugen being a North Korean woman and husband being a South Korean man? Or as you said, and I'm sure everyone who's been in a relationship can agree, was just, part of maybe, you know, a mismatch, a personal mismatch? I feel that it was a personal mismatch, you know. Of course there are cultural differences and I myself am in a, you know, two culture relationship. I mean, there are always cultural differences, but I think at a base, there needs to be, yeah, there needs to be a relation, the relationship has to be on more solid ground. And I think for Eugene and her ex-husband, they had established your relationship quite quickly and they had fallen in love quickly.
29:12 I think probably there wasn't enough time to really understand the other person. When you date someone for less than a year, you just don't get to see every side of them. You don't get to meet every part of their family and you are just not prepared for all of the aspects that come into the marriage. So of course there were cultural differences and we do highlight that in the film. But I think that at a base, you know, they just lack the foundation. After spending so much time with these women and these couples, what did you come to understand about how South Korean society actually views North Korean defectors, particularly North Korean women?
29:50 Was there anything that surprised you? In the film, we have a scene where Eugene is with her friends. And these are all mostly northern women who are also running businesses for a successful. And when they're all hanging out together, you and we, we edited a lot of scenes out, but there, it's almost like two sides of the coin. There is a lot of fascination from Southerners saying, oh my goodness, I didn't know you were a northerner because you have no accent. You look completely polished and chic and stylish. I would never know that you were a northerner, right? And you seem so successful. So there's that fascination and admiration and
30:31 respect, knowing that these are people who arrived here and had nothing really, right? Or, you know, had some government support, but really start from nothing and had, you understand, these are really self-made people. And on the other side, you also have comments like, oh, you know, they're, they're so rude or they're speaking, you know, they speak in a very rude way or, you know, and they're like, oh, it's because they're northerners, you know. So there's a lot of these like kind of slight comments of like, they're like that because they're northerners. And, you know, and they're, and they're, And so you see and you capture this, and it's just such a dichotomy. It's like, okay.
31:07 And so I think Southerners do see them as a lot of times second-class citizens, and the northerners do feel that. I think for a lot of them, when they are together, you suddenly hear all of the northern accents coming out from their different regions. But when you speak to them separately, there are almost all of them are speaking in the soul dialect right just this proper clean southern southern way southern korean like dialect and it's just it's just interesting to me to hear that where it comes out where they feel comfortable being showing that part of themselves and
31:46 where they feel less comfortable doing that was there a person or a moment in the film again i'm trying not to give too many spoilers but was there a person or a moment in the film that you you think audiences will come away from seeing very differently than they expect it. I wonder how audience would really be viewing, let's say, the men, you know, of the film. When we were filming it, we, of course, we didn't have as much footage of the men than we did of the women. But I've heard quite very, varied things from audiences. Some people said, wow, are the men okay, you know, being portrayed this way? They seem so like comical or, you know, I'm not sure if I would feel comfortable being portrayed that way. And surprisingly, let's say,
32:36 the male characters are telling us that I thought I would just be a comic element in here. That was, I understood that that was how I would be portrayed. For instance, the husband of Hyuju, who is the couple that Eugene has matched, he, when we are filming him, a lot of of the footage that we have of him, he's actually in between jobs. And he's, it's like the first time in many years that he finally gets to stay home for like three weeks straight. You know, because as you know, Koreans don't go on vacation that long. They don't take long breaks. And so he's like in this gray jumpsuit, just playing games, listening to like political podcasts and just vegging and sleeping and doing all sorts of stuff. And I'm sure if you just see it, you know,
33:22 him like that, you're thinking, oh my gosh, does he have a job or what's going on here? But, you know, you find out later that he's a programmer and he works in Kangnam and you're like, okay, so, you know, completely different, right? But so I think there is, there could be some misunderstanding, but I think when you actually start to watch the film and you catch these details, you realize, okay, well, well, he's not quite the slop that I thought he was or there is more to that relationship than I thought. And I think that's also nice to. I want to go back to a point that you made earlier because I think it's particularly important when telling these kinds of stories. He said that the aim of this film was it's not a political film.
34:04 And when you and Morton have previously spoken about the film, one thing that came through quite strongly was that you didn't want these people to become symbols of North Korea or symbols of reunification. And you wanted audiences just to enjoy them and just to respond to them as people. So why is it important to. resist making an overtly political film out of a subject that is essentially so inherently political. So a lot of the work that I do outside of this documentary and cultural spaces, I did work in the political sphere as well. I mean, I worked as a cultural mediator on a project that was called the Korea Negotiation Initiative. And this was like pre-COVID really working around this space between the two Koreas and the U.S. And trying to find, you know, some kind of golden bridge that everyone could meet at.
34:58 And even there, I mean, when you work on projects like this or when you just look at the media space, back then at least, people were just so intensely interested only in the politics of everything. What did Chairman Kim say? What did President Trump say? What did President Moon say? How are they acting? And it was just so like, it's so political. Everything is so politically laden, you know? And there would be really hardly any cultural work happening, you know, around that.
35:30 Or people were just not as interested. I think, ironically, now people seem more interested in the more cultural aspects or what kind of apps are they using on their? phones, what are they reading or what are they watching? People seem to be more interested in that lately, I feel, but six years ago, seven years ago, eight years ago, people were not really interested in that. So I think being able to look at this space, this cultural space, being able to pull out some other narrative that is not political, I think, to both Morton and I was quite important because we both work in the cultural field a lot of times or the
36:09 artistic field. And that is the role of culture in art. It's not to boycott another country just because of their political stance. It's really trying to see what is possible artistically, what is possibly culturally to really, what is this exchange? What are the boundaries and limitations of it? How much can we expand this and understand each other better? While the aim of this film was not to make it about politics. I think the context of how much inter-Korean politics did change over the period while you were making this film is super important because you started filming back in 2019. And by the time you'd finished five years later, Kim Jong-un had gone and abandoned your reunification as a national goal and define South Korea as a separate hostile state. So when you were filming these very personal
37:01 attempts to bridge the divide, the political relationship between the two Koreas was moving, in exactly the opposite direction. Did living with that contradiction for five years change how you personally think about reunification or even about what the divide between North and South Korea now means? I think that for me, reunification was something that I grew up. I went to school in Korea as well and it's this, you know, we had ethics class. And in that class you would always talk about, you would sing songs about reunification, You would talk about it.
37:36 You would watch TV shows in the 80s and 90s on family reunifications happening. And so it's something I think naturally ingrained in me that it would be nice if the two countries were reunified just because that's what they were before these 70 years of division. And I think I am still a part of that older generation that feels that way, feels that language and culture and the 5,000 years of history together are more important than these. 70 years of separation, but of course that's very idealistic. And I, as I interact more with younger people these days, people who are 20, 30 years my junior, I hear what they are saying also, which is that they don't really think that it's necessary to unify, or, you know, it's going to be okay to be two states and operate as two states going forward, and they think that that's preferable. And so I see both sides of that, and I think politically it just seems very
38:33 difficult right now as well, right? We'll see how things change in the next couple of years while President Trump is still in office. But a lot of it is really out of our hands. You know, this kind of civil society level interaction or exchange that can happen is just a really small part of it. But I think the biggest movement happens when there is like political and civil society working together, you know, when it's not just like a political movement, but it's like political and civil society working together in different ways, moving together. I think this is where you see the most traction or most movement happening. So Sonia you've now spent years with this story and presumably watched it with audiences who come to it, probably knowing very different amounts about North Korea.
39:22 If there's one thing that you hope people understand differently after spending time with Eugene and the people around her, what would it be? What I really enjoy is when, and the film so far has really opened mostly in Europe. And when I see some European audiences coming in, and there are, of course, a lot of women coming into this film to watch it and coming in with the idea of thinking, this is some kind of documentary about mail order brides. And women who are probably going to be submissive or put in their place and the man totally manhandling the situation or directing how things are going to be. And I think in Korean we have this word like you come in with semo nun, like these triangular eyes, like you have this bias already. You're like, okay, I'm already skeptical.
40:09 And at the end of the film, a lot of them come out and they're genuinely shocked. They're genuinely touched by how these women are still able to be authentically themselves, haven't really changed so much. It's like their spirit is still there and really see that these women who have gone, through this process of escaping North Korea, establishing themselves in this society, making it, having children, some of them being single mothers at times. All of this, like they really understand takes so much, so much energy and persistence and passion and diligence and intelligence. And so I think there's a different perspective of seeing what these women are like. And I think that's just so
40:59 satisfying. Yeah, and just understanding that they're not so different from the rest of us. And so before we wrap up, where can people see North South Man Woman next? And what are you working on now? Well, if you are in Europe, you can watch North South Man Woman on a lot of your public television channels. It's probably online. We are not yet in a streaming service, but I hope that we will be soon. So stay tuned. You can find us online. And if you know me personally, please write to me and I'll also direct you to the right channel. Yeah, but it's been really nice to see it roll out and meet people and hear from people about what the reception is. And I think most importantly, I really love sharing this with Eugene and the characters and helping them understand that even though they may not have thought so, look how people have been touched by this or look at how your story affected them.
41:57 So I'm really excited for them to be here in Korea and to watch the film with Korean audience on a big screen. And right now I'm working on writing a book, a children's book. I'm also looking at different ideas. I'm exploring them and doing a lot of work on somatic work on my body and just doing something completely different from what I've been doing in the past. five, six years. Son Kim, co-director of North South Man-Women. Thank you so much for coming back to the NK News podcast.
42:35 Thank you for having me, Elena. And that brings us to the end of today's episode. Our thanks to Brian Betts and David Choi for helping make this podcast happen. For more reporting, analysis and expert insight on North Korea, visit NK News for the latest stories and NKPro for deeper analysis, data and research tools. You can also watch this.
42:57 episode on YouTube and be sure to follow us on social media for the latest updates, clips and behind the scenes content. I'm Alana Hill. Thank you for listening and we'll be back next time with more on the stories shaping North Korea.