Min Kwak
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It Wasn’t Written
Documentary / Experimental Film (2018)
This documentary / experimental film is to make alternative visual historiography on North - South Korea and surrounded countries in order to challenge dominant Western journalism and provoke viewers’ self-evaluation on their perception on North Korea. The project is to illuminate audience, mainly Americans, the hidden parts of Korean history such as how Korean peninsula has been interrupted by powerful countries andused as a tool for their power game. The goal of the project is to make audience think about their previous experiences of media and journalism and how those have constructed the images of North Korea to sustain America’s international power.
Research 1 : Positioning
This positioning chart indicates the approximate positioning of each countries’ and parties’ toward North Korea. Based on research of recent news (April 2018 ~ now) of prominent press including both liberal and conservative sides of South Korea and the United States, I created this positioning chart on quadrant.
Research 2 : Survey with Group Semiotic Analysis
I conducted this research to explore how photos related to political phenomenons can be interpreted differently depending on viewers’ background, nationality, and political perspective. The analysis material are 5 pages, first page is an example of semiotic analysis in order to facilitate respondents’ understanding, next 3 pages have one photo in each, and the last page contains brief survey asking nationality, political background, opinion on North Korea’s future, and feedbacks. The number of respondents is 30, including 10 different nationalities including China, America and South Korea. The result facilitated to understand my main audience’ points of view such as strong objections on dictatorship and human rights abuse of North Korea, distrust on Trump’s administration, and pessimism towards achieving world peace.
Page 1–4 of Group Semiotic Analysis
Page 5 of Group Semiotic Analysis
Distribution Map
This map indicates respondents’ nationalities, political perspective and their opinion on North Korea’s future. 14 of 30 respondents from 9 nationalities saw North Korea’s optimistic future, and half of that, 7 respondents from 4 nationalities’ opinions were pessimistic. It also shows a clear pattern of American liberals and Chinese conservatives. 3 American liberals responded pessimistic, 4 Chinese conservatives responded optimistic, and there is no other respondents of different nationality. Also I could find an interesting point that how different nationalities could gather in liberal-optimistic area.
It Wasn’t Written - Draft Film
This is the rough sketch of documentary film utilizing broadcasting footages, movie clips, and object shots to symbolize political situations.
Production of Film
This project has been taking a shape as experimental documentary film, which is a mixture of broadcasting footages, movie clips, shots made by myself, and sound effects. Footages shot by myself are symbolic expressions using objects such as chess pieces, and also interviews that interviewees are talking as if they are Kim Jong Un, has conducted. No voiceover, it delivers the story in literal and metaphorical way so that audience would notice the essential information well but at the same time various interpretations would be possible. Experimental style has been inspired by Jean-Luc Godard, and general ambience would be bright and fun so that audience can be easily involved in it. Story goes from political figures to other political figures in nonlinear way so that each contents can be connected organically.
Major Storyline
