From the category archives:

Documentaries

For those who missed this excellent documentary when it showed on the BBC recently, it’s returning to cinemas this month under its theatrical name, The Red Chapel. It’s also a slightly longer cut, 87 minutes as opposed to the hour that the BBC gave it. The screenings are part of the Human Rights Watch film [...]

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Kim Jong-il’s Comedy Club – the tweets

15 February 2010 DPRK
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It’s not often that Twitter is alive with Tweets about a documentary on BBC4, but Kim Jong-il’s Comedy Club was special. Here are some of them.

LKL: Game for a laugh? Don’t forget Kim Jong-il’s Comedy Club tonight, BBC4, 10pm http://bit.ly/bT9eZE #
LKL: Wow this documentary is bizarre!! #

Alex_Hoban: @lklinks you’re telling me…!

Alex_Hoban: EVERYONE WATCH BBC4 NOW, [...]

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A pizza shovel for the Dear Leader: was he amused by “Kim Jong-il’s Comedy Club”?

9 February 2010 DPRK
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Kim Jong-il’s Comedy Club is a Danish documentary which follows the two-week visit to North Korea by a Danish comedy double-act who had received permission to perform in Pyongyang’s National Theatre. The documentary is fascinating on many levels. First, the two comedians are ethnic Korean adoptees, born in South Korea but brought up in Denmark, [...]

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LKL Weekly Tweets, 2009-08-24

24 August 2009 Bong Joon-ho
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Congratulations to Yang Yong-eun on winning the US PGA golf championship http://bit.ly/2Jw6M #. “It’s not like you’re in an octagon where you’re fighting against Tiger and he’s going to bite you, or swing at you with his 9-iron,” Yang said through an interpreter. “The worst that I could do was just lose to Tiger. So [...]

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The divers of Jeju-do

9 April 2009 Documentaries
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LKL digests Barbara Hammer’s documentary “Diving Women of Jeju-do”, which screened in a recent film festival in London.

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Escaping North Korea – documentary on BBC

8 April 2009 DPRK
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Details of a showing of the Chosun Ilbo documentary about North Korean escapees and their flight to South Korea

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The Gwanghwamun and its many rebirths

29 March 2009 Conference reports
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A feature on the great gate of the Gyeongbukgung in Seoul

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Upcoming Haenyo film screening

28 March 2009 Documentaries
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Notice of a screening of a documentary on Cheju Island’s famous haenyeo (해녀) in a double bill of groundbreaking documentaries by celebrated lesbian experimental filmmaker Barbara Hammer

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A North Korean Feelgood Lecture

23 January 2009 Conference reports
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A report on the fascinating talk given by Nick Bonner about making documentaries in North Korea

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Nick Bonner – Filming North Korea

13 January 2009 DPRK
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Details of a talk at SOAS given by the producer of three famous documentary films about North Korea, including A State of Mind

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Saturday documentaries at the KCC: Koryo Buddhist Paintings

8 November 2008 Buddhism
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Every Saturday, from November till the end of December, the KCC will be screening a documentary on Koryo Buddhist Paintings.

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Make this Saturday a Korean day

22 August 2008 Documentaries
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I’ve already told you about the films this Saturday. Take your pick between The Chaser at 4:40 in Leicester Square and Seven Days in Brunswick Square at 6:30.
How about making a whole day of it?
Turn up at the Korean Cultural Centre earlier in the day and browse the DVD / CD library and watch your [...]

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Saturday documentaries at the KCC

24 July 2008 Documentaries
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This Saturday there will be a screening of a short film entitled “The History of Gold” at the Korean Cultural Centre at 12pm, 2pm and 4pm.
Each screening will last around 30 minutes.

Silla dynasty gold earrings, 6th century AD. Diameter 3.5cm, Height 8.3cm. National Treasure No. 90, Seoul National Museum.
Silla people decorate their houses with silk [...]

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Crossing the Line screening, with Q&A

4 August 2007 DPRK

One of these last-minute things I’m afraid. I just checked my least-used email account to find information about a screening of Crossing the Line at the Frontline Club (near Paddington Station) tomorrow, Sunday. There was to have been a Q&A hosted by director Dan Gordon, but he’s had to pull out due to ill health, [...]

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Koryo Saram – the Unreliable People

10 May 2007 Documentaries
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Report of a documentary film screening at SOAS on 2 May, by Michael Rank

Koryo Saram – The Unreliable People is a fascinating one-hour documentary about the 200,000 ethnic Koreans who were deported to Kazakhstan by Stalin in 1937. It includes archive footage never seen before outside the former Soviet Union as well as interviews with [...]

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