April 25, 2024
Analysis

The legend of Pak Pong Ju: a film tribute to N. Korea’s premier

"Guarantee" depicts Pak as the ideal Party man and offers possible hints about his biography

North Korea’s current premier, Pak Pong Ju, is an old man to be leading his country in decisively new directions, but at 78, that is exactly what he seemingly is doing.

In this first of a two-part series, we will look at the legend of the man as presented in a film about him – well, a film that is widely rumored to be about him anyway. In North Korea, there is a convention that living leaders (besides the Kims) will not be immortalized in films, and only after they die might they grace the silver screen or be the subject of documentaries.

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