North Korea

[tw]

North Korea's Kim Jong Il inherited his father's ring wing extremist, introverted, and fearful government. Getting them to open up to the world has been made even more complicated now that George Jr has declared N Korea on the list of countries to invade. But Kim Jong Il has not stopped his attempts to enlighten his people. For the first time, N Korea conducted an open Ninth Pyongyang Film Festival.

from The Economist of 14 Oct 2004
The selection at this year's festival was surprisingly open as well. Topics such as homosexuality and the loneliness of the elderly were featured, not swept under the carpet. A retrospective of a German film-maker, Margarethe von Trotta, Indonesian sitcoms, Austrian documentaries, Hong Kong action movies and “Bend It Like Beckham”, a multi-racial British comedy, were all on show. True, the final prize list sounded like a roll call of the axis of evil and its associates (first China, then Iran and Syria) but the five members of the international jury said they had made their choices without duress, and were impressed by the quality of this year's selection.

Another special guest at the festival was the head of the German delegation, Uwe Schmelter. Usually in charge of the Goethe Institute in Seoul, he was responsible for an impressive showing of German films and documentaries, and even brought along a famous German actress. He is well known in the north for having presided over the opening in June of Pyongyang's own Goethe Institute, the first foreign cultural centre in North Korea. It offers some 8,000 books, CDs, videos and German newspapers and magazines—all freely available to any North Korean. It is a small indication that things are slowly starting to change.