Body
In the “better late than never” category, I finally had the chance to see Canadian film-maker Ann Shin’s The Defector, a well-made documentary on the smuggling networks that get North Koreans refugees out of China to Thailand. Opening in 2012 and playing a number of film festivals, it continues to make the rounds--I saw it at an International Rescue Committee fundraiser--and it is available on iTunes. As with all such contemporary documentaries it has a useful website, replete with an interactive portion that takes you through some of the more harrowing features of the regime and its victims. For educators, this is a good introduction to the issues and worth seeing by anyone interested in the refugee issue.
The stories of the five women on this journey are unfortunately typical; one trafficked to a Chinese husband, another subjected to return and abuse following an earlier escape, all consumed by guilt and doubt. But curiously, the central figure in the drama is the coyote himself, a complex character named Dragon. He is in turn defensive about his role, claiming the status of a human rights activist, and at the same time a businessman in a high-risk profession trying to assure he gets paid. For cost reasons, the transit through China takes place in part on public transportation, in part by drivers, and in part by help from paid smugglers in the Golden Triangle region of Laos; although this part is not filmed, you can bet that these guys did not share Dragon’s deep contempt for the regime. As we learn in the film, he and his family were victims of the songbun system; his grandparents were apparently among those who fled south.
Shin’s team accompanies them on most of the route except for the Laotion portion. The filmmaking is spare and Shin keeps sermonizing or even interpretation to a minimum. Unlike others she doesn’t overplay the risk she herself has taken on and admits that she may have added to the refugees’; she allows the journey itself to tell the story. It is small comfort, but the joy of these women when reaching Thailand is palpable even if the follow-up by Shin in Seoul reveals the complexities of refugee life. One of the moral complexities: Dragon is apparently stiffed by some of the women on arrival, who are squeezed between his demands and the high costs facing an émigré in the South.
A parallel story concerns a Mr. Heo, who is seeking immigration status in Canada. Tae-sup Heo's first wife and daughter both died of famine-related diseases in North Korea. Having lost all his family, he left North Korea and worked in a Chinese coal mine, casting light on how some of the men in China fare. He is finally documented in Canada—preferring it to South Korea--but after a process that is clearly stressful.
One of the better documentaries on the subject to date.
