Paris to Pyongyang(2024)

Crossing the Line(en)

In 1962, a U.S. soldier sent to guard the peace in South Korea deserted his unit, walked across the most heavily fortified area on earth and defected to the Cold War enemy, the communist state of North Korea. He became a star of the North Korean propaganda machine, but then disappeared from the face of the earth. Now, after 45 years, the story of James Dresnok, the last American defector in North Korea, is being told for the first time. Crossing the Line follows Dresnok as he recalls his childhood, desertion, and life in the DPRK.

North Korea: Inside The Mind of a Dictator(en)

A journey through Kim Jong Un’s past and present to understand the man and the myth who holds North Korea’s uncertain future in his hands.

A State of Mind(en)

Two young North Korean gymnasts prepare for an unprecedented competition in this documentary that offers a rare look into the communist society and the daily lives of North Korean families. For more than eight months, film crews follow 13-year-old Pak Hyon Sun and 11-year-old Kim Song Yun and their families as the girls train for the Mass Games, a spectacular nationalist celebration.

Shadow Flowers(ko)

Ryun-hee Kim, a North Korean housewife, was forced to come to South Korea and became its citizen against her will. As her seven years of struggle to go back to her family in North Korea continues, the political absurdity hinders her journey back to her loved ones. The life of her family in the North goes on in emptiness, and she fears that she might become someone, like a shadow, who exists only in the fading memory of her family.​

North Korea: A Day in the Life(nl)

If the cityscapes and patriotic anthems of this film seem a far cry from the bleak landscape of Seoul Train, that's no accident. Dutch filmmaker Pieter Fleury, with the full permission and cooperation of the North Korean government, created this propaganda film that gives us a glimpse of a day in the life of one of the world's most enigmatic societies. A Day in the Life, largely dictated by the North Korean film bureau, follows a typical North Korean family through their daily duties, largely dedicated to the pride in the North Korean nation of comrades and the glory of General Kim Jong Il. The film is meant to extol the success of modern North Korea. But does it? With straight footage and a total absence of narration, viewers may interpret Fleury's film in a slightly different manner than intended

Homes Apart: Korea(ko)

They speak the same language, share a similar culture and once belonged to a single nation. When the Korean War ended in 1953, ten million families were torn apart. By the early 90s, as the rest of the world celebrated the end of the Cold War, Koreans remain separated between North and South, fearing the threat of mutual destruction. Beginning with one man's journey to reunite with his sister in North Korea, filmmakers Takagi and Choy reveal the personal, social and political dimensions of one of the last divided nations on earth. The film was also the first US project to get permission to film in both South & North Korea.

The Fantastic(ko)

In Maija Blåfield’s documentary, eight former North Koreans talk about what it was like to watch illegal films in a closed society. In addition to the 'waste videos', South Korean films were also smuggled into the country via China.

The Trap of Kim(fr)

The escalation of tensions between Pyongyang and Washington continues, plunging the world into fear of a nuclear war. Update on the geopolitical issues of this conflict.

Pyongyang in Four Seasons(ko)

Pyongyang, a city full of happy people and flowers. A city of factories with smiling seamstresses and welders of locomotives. A city of power plants the illuminate department stores offering the fruits of the labour of its workers and peasants. Everybody spends their free time in sports palaces with synchronized swimming and white doves, or in the palace of cultures, where young pioneers play the accordion. Old men and women go on walks and young lovers rent boats by the river, above which arches a rainbow, a symbol of happiness and contentment.

Kimjongilia(en)

The first film to fully expose the humanitarian crisis of North Korea, this stylish, deeply moving documentary is centered around astonishing interviews with survivors of North Korea's vast and largely hidden prison camps, and interspersed with archival footage of North Korean propoganda films and original art performances.

Inside North Korea(en)

Join National Geographic's Lisa Ling as she captures a rare look inside North Korea - something few Americans have ever been able to do. Posing as an undercover medical coordinator and closely guarded throughout her trip, Lisa moves inside the most isolated nation in the world, encountering a society completely dominated by government and dictatorship. Glimpse life inside North Korea as you've never seen before with personal accounts and powerful footage. Witness first-hand efforts by humanitarians and the challenges they face from the rogue regime.

Assassins(en)

True crime meets global spy thriller in this gripping account of the assassination of Kim Jong-nam, the half brother of the North Korean leader. The film follows the trial of the two female assassins, probing the question: were the women trained killers or innocent pawns of North Korea?

Dictator: One Crazy Job(fr)

They’ve become the human face of inhuman barbarity. Leaders like Hitler, Idi Amin Dada, Stalin, Kim Jong Il, Saddam Hussein, Nicolae Ceausescu, Bokassa, Muammar Kadhafi, Khomeini, Mussolini and Franco governed their countries completely cut off from reality. These paranoid leaders were driven to abuse their power by the pathology of power itself. Dictators are driven by a relentless, thought-out determination to impose themselves as infallible, all-knowing and all-powerful beings. But they are also men ruled by their caprices, uncontrollable impulses, and reckless fits of frenzy, which paradoxically render them as human as anyone else. The abuses they committed were clearly atrocious, yet some of them were as outlandish as the characters portrayed in the film The Dictator. They sunk to depths worthy of Kafka: so incredibly absurd, they are outrageously funny.

Hana, dul, sed(de)

Dennis Rodman's Big Bang in PyongYang(en)

Dennis Rodman is on a mission. After forging an unlikely friendship with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, he wants to improve relations between North Korea and the US by staging a historic basketball game between the two countries. But the North Korean team isn't the only opposition he'll face... Condemned by the NBA and The Whitehouse, and hounded every step of the way by the press, can Dennis keep it together and make the game happen? Or will it go up in a mushroom cloud of smoke? For the first time, discover the true story of what happened when Dennis Rodman took a team of former-NBA players to North Korea and staged the most controversial game of basketball the world has never seen.

Cinema in the Land of Comrade Kim(fa)

The love of Kim Jong Il, the former dictator of North Korea, for cinema and his adventures, including the kidnapping of a director.

Beyond Utopia(en)

A courageous pastor uses his underground network to rescue and aid North Korean families as they risk their lives to embrace freedom.

Dear Pyongyang(ja)

Dear Pyongyang is a documentary film by Zainichi Korean director Yang Yong-hi (Korean: 양영희, Hanja: 梁英姬) about her own family. It was shot in Osaka Japan (Yang's hometown) and Pyongyang, North Korea, In the 1970s, Yang's father, an ardent communist and leader of the pro-North movement in Japan, sent his three sons from Japan to North Korea under a repatriation campaign sponsored by ethnic activist organisation and de facto North Korean embassy Chongryon; as the only daughter, Yang herself remained in Japan. However, as the economic situation in the North deteriorated, the brothers became increasingly dependent for survival on the care packages sent by their parents. The film shows Yang's visits to her brothers in Pyongyang, as well as conversations with her father about his ideological faith and his regrets over breaking up his family.

Korea, A Hundred Years of War(fr)

A contemporary history of Korea(s) from a unique point of view that embraces the inner history of both South and North Korea in a single narrative.

North Korea's Secret Slaves: Dollar Heroes(en)

Shrouded in secrecy and notoriously cash-strapped the North Korean regime has resorted to running one of the world's largest slaving operations - exploiting the profits to fulfil their own agenda. These bonded labourers can be found in Russia, China and dozens of other countries around the world including EU member states. Featuring undercover footage and powerful testimonials, we reveal the scale and brutality of the operation and ask what, if anything, is being done to stop it.