All Monsters Must Die (14 page)

Oddly enough, they also did some shooting in the West. They rented the legendary Bavaria Film Studios in Munich for the fantasy film
The Tale of Shim Cheong
, a musical based on an ancient Korean myth about a princess living in a kingdom at the bottom of the sea. Shin actually already made one version of this myth in South Korea in 1972. Seven North Korean guards watched every step they took during production.

Madame Choi and Shin had become an unmistakable part of the elite, and Kim Jong-il seemed to think that they had found their place.

ON ONE OCCASION,
Madame and Shin decided to smuggle a tape recorder into a meeting with Kim Jong-il. They wanted proof that they hadn't come to North Korea of their own volition, proof that they could bring with them on the day they succeeded in escaping.

At the meeting, Kim Jong-il speaks openly about how he was “forced” to bring them to North Korea. An important part of the country's social structure was failing, and he had to take care of it, he explained. He needed to re-establish artistry in film. “I acknowledge that we lag behind in filmmaking techniques,” he said. He added that bringing them to North Korea wasn't actually weighing on his conscience. But he excused himself anyway, saying: “We're all part of the same nation, the land of the Joseon era.”

* * *

THE STUDIO IS
deserted and the giant buildings rest on their secrets. An office complex surrounds an area that resembles a town square large enough to hold an army of film workers. The studio guide says that the filmmakers are currently on location.

A bronze sculpture group stands on the square. It depicts Kim Il-sung in an overcoat, his arms resting tenderly on a little girl's shoulders. Her hair is braided and she is smiling. Her small hand grips one of the leader's index fingers. A film crew are to the right, cameras ready, and seem to be awaiting instruction, notepads and pens at hand. To the left are the girl's parents, who look proudly on as their daughter is embraced by the Great Leader. They wait subserviently for the moment they can present him with a basket of flowers. There is no doubt that the filmmaking will sprout from the Great Leader's advice. But right now, the leader is busy. A little girl with braids has crossed his path. She is a representative of the child race, so the leader drops everything to speak to her, and the filmmakers wait patiently for his instructions.

The bus takes us to the backlot to view the sets. They aren't really sets, but actual houses that have been built in a variety of styles. The guide points out that, this way, you can shoot from more angles. At the first stop we are allowed to view a few buildings that are meant to look like they are from the late Joseon period. To our dismay, we are immediately offered the opportunity to try on clothing from the costume department. Andrei is transformed into a feudal lord with a yellow silk cape, a hat, and a fake beard. Suddenly he perks up. He slowly stalks about the muddy ground with a regal expression, waving his arms theatrically, before taking his place on a wobbly wooden throne. The Bromma boys have found some wigs; the chubby one pulls on a bright red wig that makes him look like a bloated, grown-up Pippi Longstocking. They flank Andrei and make faces for the camera.

AFTER THIS EXCRUCIATING
scene, we are finally allowed to see the various towns that have been constructed for film shoots. We see the muddy streets of the studio's vision of Seoul at the time of the Japanese occupation. Another set depicts a decadent nightlife area in Tokyo; naive scenery portrays immoral life in modern-day Seoul. There is a bucolic Asian farming idyll from an unspecified time, and a Bavarian village — the illusion is successful at a distance but then you get closer and see that the houses are made of reinforced concrete. The average North Korean citizen's ideas about the world have been shaped by these sets.

We take pictures of the signs in the studio town: the “Oasis” bar; “Happy Toothpaste,” a store that sells nylon underwear; “Fujicolor,” painted by a shaky hand. Korean and Chinese characters are used for these establishments. On a sign for a leather-goods store, all of the shoes and handbags are depicted as if they have fallen into a corner. Life in the West is brazenly luxurious.
L
UXURIOUS SHIRTS, TIES, SUITS AND MAKE-UP
, proclaims one sign. Another advertises something as superfluous as pet accessories. A funny dog wearing sunglasses, a pearl necklace, and a hat is painted on it. Another sign is even more peculiar:
WOMEN'S WRESTLING CLOTHES
.

The film posters on advertising columns are hand-painted. They illustrate versions of real films. Elements of famous movies have been mashed up, the casting has been changed, and they've created imaginary hybrid films.
The Seven Year Itch
shows a portrait of a woman who looks more like Jeanne Moreau than Marilyn Monroe.
Giant
features new actors: Clark Gable and Jane Russell instead of James Dean and Elizabeth Taylor.
Treasure Island
has the British actor Robert Newton in the lead as in the real film, but he's acting opposite an unknown co-star: “Linda Danelle.”

* * *

WE IMAGINE THAT
if we had been in this film studio exactly twenty-four years ago, in September 1984, we would have encountered an unusual rubber costume hanging on a stand. It resembles an armadillo standing on its hind legs. In a farming village, a forge is being built. It's supposed to be a feudal village in the 1300s, during the Goryeo dynasty, even if the architecture isn't strictly of its time.

A Japanese film crew from Toho Studios in Tokyo has just arrived. The group comprises a number of special effects artists, along with suit actors Kenpachiro Satsuma and the diminutive Masao Fukazawa — stage name “Little Man Machan” — a former wrestling star and the embodiment of Godzilla's son, Minilla. They have brought a large load of Styrofoam because this material isn't available in North Korea. It will be used to make boulders that will be rolled down into a ravine in order to crush the Imperial Army.

The monster's head, with its evil grin, lies on the ground next to the stand with the rubber suit. Little Man Machan, who is barely four feet tall, climbs a ladder so he can take the suit down from its stand. His head sticks up out of the rubber torso and Satsuma crowns it with the monster's head. Little Man Machan takes a few unsteady steps in the stiff, cumbersome costume, and struggles to raise his arms.

The monster springs to life.

KIM JONG-IL HAD
the fantastic idea of copying a concept from his arch-enemy, Japan. He thought a
kaiju
(monster)
movie might unite the nation, and in the frenzy around the film, the monster itself would become an idol. The creature could be spread to the masses in the form of a plastic toy. And best of all, a message could be embedded in this adventure — a message that would fill the people with courage. The movie would bear the monster's name: Pulgasari.

How the Toho crew had ended up in North Korea was something of a mystery. Satsuma himself wrote about the events in his autobiography
I Am the Actor
. He strikes a trickster-like pose on the cover, resembling a Toshiro Mifune lookalike, and his tone is self-regarding. In his filmography, pornography and comedies are listed alongside his many monster films. But he doesn't mention Little Man Machan's alleged behind-the-scenes involvement in the production of
Pulgasari
. Rumours of connections to the Japanese mafia swirled around the diminutive actor.

According to Satsuma, the Toho crew thought they were en route to Hollywood for an assignment, but just before they departed they were told they were supposed to shoot in North Korea instead. Along with their boss Mr. Suzuki, one Mr. Kazuo Kinagawa from Hong Kong had taken care of the arrangements. The Hong Kong man clearly was an employee of Kim Jong-il. Whether he tricked Mr. Suzuki or bribed him, Satsuma doesn't say.

After one week of filming in a studio in Beijing, the Toho crew arrived in Pyongyang. The crew members were chauffeured in Mercedes Benzes on empty roads that had no traffic lights and they spent the night in one of Kim Jong-il's private residences. Satsuma describes his surprise upon seeing the studio. The newly built four-storey building had 300 rooms.

THE TOHO CREW
was quartered in a first-class hotel in central Pyongyang. The rooms had brick-red walls and moss-green, wall-to-wall carpeting, as well as trouser presses and marble bathtubs. Breakfast was always the same: toast that crumbled as soon as you touched it, goat milk, fried radishes, bacon, eggs, and apples. In the evenings, they'd grab a drink in the hotel bar. The prices were unpredictable. One whisky could cost 2,000 yen (about 8 dollars), the same price they'd pay for the whole crew's tab on another night. Other times it was free.

Phone calls home were allowed only if they were requested a week in advance, but they were permitted to watch
NHK
, Japan's national television station. After a month they were downgraded. The Mercedes were replaced with Volvos, and the crew was moved to a more modest hotel.

But the strangest part of the whole situation was that the director was the famous South Korean Shin Sang-ok. And his celebrity actress-wife Madame Choi sometimes appeared on set. Why was South Korea's leading director of melodrama filming a
kaiju
movie in Pyongyang? He'd left for the North, they knew, but had he been bribed or forced? They could do nothing but speculate. No one dared to ask.

* * *

BEFORE WE ENTER
the studio's sound stage, the guide says that Kim Jong-il often comes here and gives solid advice. To us, the advice sounds a bit general: “Preserve these buildings and use them more effectively.” The guide says that North Korean filmmakers sometimes experience doubt and insecurity. In moments like these it's good to have a stable, firm authority to lean on. They phone Kim Jong-il and get answers to their questions. This is how one makes a “perfect film.”

The sound stage has seen better days. If you don't take the worn wooden scenery flats and the abraded bucket seats into account, the studio takes you right back to the 1980s. As far as we can tell, the latest sound technology at that time was installed in the screening room. But they haven't upgraded since it was built.

A film that is in the process of being mastered starts to play on the screen. It begins with the logo of the North Korean film industry, which we recognize from
Pulgasari
's opening credits and the large mosaic on the studio square. The symbol depicts a sculpture in Pyongyang: the winged horse Chollima, a Korean pegasus leaping into the future. According to the folk tales, the Chollima can run 400 kilometres in a day and no knight could ever tame it. In the terminology of the revolution, “Chollima-speed” is the speed with which North Korean society surges forth. The Chollima Movement in the 1950s was the North Korean answer to Mao's Great Leap Forward.

A montage of documentary and feature-film scenes about the war against Japan follows the Chollima logo. There are arrogant Japanese businessmen with round glasses and Hitler moustaches, slaves working in a quarry, and gangsters wearing pinstriped jazz suits. We recognize the actors' gestures from North Korean dramas: someone falls on the ground and reaches up his arm in anguish; someone wipes the sweaty, bloody foreheads of the dying; families and lovers are torn apart, crying and screaming.

We are gripped by the feeling that we are nearing the heart of the story. This could be the command centre of our story. We are rapt, but our fellow travellers are silent and bored. Even Elias seems distracted. In the darkness, we hear someone snoring.

WITH AWE AND
wonder, Shin and Madame watched the studio grow. They couldn't help but feel flattered; Kim Jong-il offered them resources that they'd never have dreamed of before. But every day they discussed their escape. They mapped out their flight like the plot twists in a screenplay, but they also knew that their plan could never be realized.

* * *

WE LEAVE THE
film studio with the feeling that something that has slipped through our fingers. Maybe we'd convinced ourselves that we could find solid evidence of Madame and Shin's time there? Perhaps a dusty monster head in a prop closet? Pulgasari's grimacing, horned mask?

Our bus travels south, passing Pyongyang's enormous triumphal arch, which is of course several metres taller than the original Arc de Triomphe in Paris, and we soon find ourselves on the Reunification Highway that leads straight as an arrow to Kaesong, right on the border with South Korea. There are four lanes with a green belt in the middle. After a while, we realize that we've never been on a highway like this before; hardly any cars are on the road. We pass a few military vehicles, and amid much irritated honking we overtake a crowded bus, but otherwise it's empty.

We see a few people doing maintenance along the road — micro-maintenance. One woman is sweeping up a pile of dry leaves and dust on the road. She squats and lifts the debris with her cupped hands, then tosses it over the barrier guard into the ditch.

ON THE BUS
ride, we look at the pictures of the production of
Pulgasari
in Kenpachiro Satsuma's memoir. There are interior shots of the hotel in Pyongyang where they stayed, as well as of restaurants, grocery stores, and department stores. The department store was a copy of one in Japan and offered both Japanese and black market goods. The staff even smiled and offered perfect greetings of “
sumimasen
” (“excuse me”), exactly as they did in Tokyo. In the hotel there was a camera store where the shopkeepers spoke accent-free Japanese. It was assumed that a number of the employees were Japanese citizens who had been kidnapped.

Until recently, North Korea has officially denied the kidnapping of Japanese people. For twenty years, their protesting relatives were considered dogmatists, even in Japan. No one believed them. But in 2002 Kim Jong-il admitted to the abduction of thirteen Japanese citizens, five of whom were allowed to go home. The Japanese government's official list contains the names of seventeen citizens (including the five who have returned), but organized groups of relatives claim that as many as eighty people are being held captive in North Korea. The question has become especially sensitive since Japan's right-wing nationalists appropriated the matter in order to make a case for remilitarization.