The Juche Idea

In the late 1960’s Kim Jong Il guaranteed his succession as the Dear Leader of North Korea by adapting his father’s Juche philosophy to propaganda, film and art. Translated as self-reliance, Juche is a hybrid of Confucian and authoritarian Stalinist pseudosocialism. The film is about a South Korean video artist who comes to a North Korean art residency to help bring Juche cinema into the 21st century.