“What is the most difficult thing about making a documentary?” I've often become aware of how a documentary film is an art form that involves reflection of my beliefs as I capture the lives of people who are not me. It's why the directors of documentaries need to maintain a certain distance and tension with the people in them. It's a cruel rule where I spend years sneaking glimpses at their lives, yet I do not support them 100%.

Rev. Kim Seong-eun of the Caleb Mission is a human rights activist who has dedicated his life to North Korean defectors. He is a man of conviction who lost his only son to an accident while working to rescue those defectors. Seeing him sobbing on the beach after burying his son there, I promised to not whitewash or distort his life. I would let my camera capture the reality of helping defectors exactly as it was.

The production process took five years. Our production crew crossed borders multiple times with Rev. Kim in Southeast Asia and met many defectors. A Good Business was finally completed in 2018. It had the aim of posing certain questions to viewers. But I wasn't satisfied with the result. There seemed to be something lacking in the conceptual aim of indicting the human rights issues facing defectors and suggesting a better direction for human rights campaigning activities.

At the Sundance Film Festival this year, Rev. Kim could be seen telling the world about the realities defectors face in another documentary titled Beyond Utopia (2022, directed by Madeleine Gavin). After learning from the overseas media that it had received a four-minute standing ovation. I cried and thought, ‘A film that a foolish director couldn't finish, and the figure in his documentary who has finally ushered it to its climax.’ That's how film carries on: If the director can't do it, the cast will. If the cast can't do it, the viewers will. If documentaries can't do it, narrative films will. If that's not enough, then other forms of cinema will. So I'd like to take this opportunity to vow: I will not give up. I will see A Good Business through. Working with the viewers, I will show the reality facing defectors and find better directions for the campaign on their behalf. LEE Harkjoon

Crossing Heaven's Border (2008), Across Land Across Sea (2011), 9 Muses Of Star Empire (2012)

The Contexts of North Korean Defection
In Korea, the concept of good is often understood more in terms of money than decency. The word good in A Good Business expresses a similar context. Closely following the defection process from North Korea through China and Southeast Asia and on to South Korea, the film shows the people involved in it: the human rights activists, the brokers, and the defectors themselves. But ahead of any good intentions, this business is mediated by money, and various desires are clearly inscribed within that. The film uses the somewhat unfamiliar term good business to indict the realities that continue to surround the North Korean defection process today.

Like the border-crossing defectors it examines, the film crosses boundaries in various ways. It is not clear how good or evil the figures' actions are or whether the things they say are true or false. It raises questions about the differences between the human rights activists and brokers, and matters concerning North Koreans' protection of human rights and overseas adoption are similarly difficult to reach any precise answers on. Most of all, the camera is not merely recording these people on their life-risking defection journey; it plays the role of companion and guardian, alternating between positions of complicity and indictment as it follows along with the brokers and activists. The people in the film are not simply being recorded, either: they actively use the camera to express their desires.

Examining the defection process through different people and places, A Good Business is a film that confronts reality not simply through reason or emotion but in a physical sense. Rather than arguing the need for such defections based on feelings of sympathy or moral imperatives, it takes on a businesslike perspective to capture the reality of defection on the ground. Toward the end, one of the figures says that the “Business of defection will continue until we have international laws in place to provide defectors with the direct help they need to get out.” It’s a message that shows the possibilities of impact cinema. LEE Seungmin

Production Borders. Inc (arisu01@naver.com)
Distribution Borders. Inc (arisu01@naver.com)
International Sales M-Line Distribution (sales@mline-distribution.com)