review : Kimjongilia

Director - N.C. Heikin

Country - South Korea [2009]

A documentary on the North Korean condition. We hear the stories of people who suffered under the Kim Family regime and to escape their misery defected. As we talk to ex military men, artists and people who were born and grew up in the North Korean prison camps, a sad and angry realization sets in. Some escape to China only to become goods of sale in human trafficking. Others seeking expatriation in Mongolia. Personal accounts of tragedies that hit the people of North Korea since its inception bring into focus the isolation of this country and more severely that of it's people.

review : Lust, Caution

Director - Ang Lee
Written by - Hui-ling Wang, James Schamus, Eileen Chang
Cast - Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Tang Wei, Joan Chen, Leehom Wang

Country - Hong Kong [2007]

It is near impossible to comprehend the circumstances of an individual unless their reality becomes your own. The western world is largely ignorant of the Japanese occupation of China, which is the premise of this period film. Set during the Second World War the Japanese Occupation disrupted, altered and manufactured a cascade of events, large and small, that would go unnoticed in the pages of history. The resistance movement in China operating in small cells tries to make headway by assassinating some of their own, who have become underlings of the Japanese to survive and further their own careers.This is the setting where a college going girl is aided and instructed to seduce the head of the secret police. But along the way the complexities of human nature are explored beyond the predictable. The ever mysterious nature of love and lust is once again revealed to be in the grey fog.  The emotional commitment of the actors to their roles is incomparable. The plot covers nearly 5 years of WW II from 1938 to 1942. I salute those who were part of this film and to the western viewers I say...