Uploaded April 2013 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago
Crossing the Line - a rare portfolio of investigative documentaries, where engaged filmmakers look at what a certain number of North Korean defectors have experienced to escape their country. At the risk of their lives and those left behind.
Korea, orphan of the Cold War, remains even in 2011 a divided country. In 1953, at the end of the Korean War, the country was cut in two opposing parts with a No Man's Land in the middle, the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone). The North, still supported by Beijing, is rumored to suffer from continuous famine and is run as a communist regime with Stalinist overtones. The South, heavily supported by Washington, is ruled as a Western-style democracy where shopping malls have appeared on every corner. This economic wealth may not necessarily make South Koreans happier than their Northern brothers and sisters, yet a growing number of North Koreans risk their lives to get out of what many call the `Hell of the North'.
Itinerary of A Rebel
In order to generate sufficient means for his wife left behind in North Korea to survive, Han accepts a job as a lumberjack in a camp situated in Siberia. The North Korean government in ruthless deals with Russian entrepreneurs offers willing citizens the opportunity for 'work' in labour camps abroad. The wages are directly paid to the government who promises to pass the money on to the families left behind.
When Han finds out that none of his wages have reached his wife, he escapes and, in an epic journey, crosses the whole of Siberia. He needs to reach Moscow where he plans to reach a Western embassy. He finally succeeds and is accepted as a refugee by the United States of America. In order to prove its existence, he accepts to return with us to the camp he escaped from.
Now he is waiting for a way to get his wife out of the North, but he refuses to go and live in South. Instead, he prepares for a new Life in the US.
Available languages : English, French
DVD, PAL
Length 52 mins.
DVD available from
Europe, UK:
US, Australia, World: http://www.artfilms.com.au/Detail.aspx?ItemID=4943
STREAMING: artfilms-digital.com
Crossing the Line - a rare portfolio of investigative documentaries, where engaged filmmakers look at what a certain number of North Korean defectors have experienced to escape their country. At the risk of their lives and those left behind.
Korea, orphan of the Cold War, remains even in 2011 a divided country. In 1953, at the end of the Korean War, the country was cut in two opposing parts with a No Man's Land in the middle, the DMZ (Demilitarized Zone). The North, still supported by Beijing, is rumored to suffer from continuous famine and is run as a communist regime with Stalinist overtones. The South, heavily supported by Washington, is ruled as a Western-style democracy where shopping malls have appeared on every corner. This economic wealth may not necessarily make South Koreans happier than their Northern brothers and sisters, yet a growing number of North Koreans risk their lives to get out of what many call the `Hell of the North'.
Itinerary of A Rebel
In order to generate sufficient means for his wife left behind in North Korea to survive, Han accepts a job as a lumberjack in a camp situated in Siberia. The North Korean government in ruthless deals with Russian entrepreneurs offers willing citizens the opportunity for 'work' in labour camps abroad. The wages are directly paid to the government who promises to pass the money on to the families left behind.
When Han finds out that none of his wages have reached his wife, he escapes and, in an epic journey, crosses the whole of Siberia. He needs to reach Moscow where he plans to reach a Western embassy. He finally succeeds and is accepted as a refugee by the United States of America. In order to prove its existence, he accepts to return with us to the camp he escaped from.
Now he is waiting for a way to get his wife out of the North, but he refuses to go and live in South. Instead, he prepares for a new Life in the US.
Available languages : English, French
DVD, PAL
Length 52 mins.
DVD available from
Europe, UK:
US, Australia, World: http://www.artfilms.com.au/Detail.aspx?ItemID=4943
STREAMING: artfilms-digital.com
