Notebook On Cities And Culture

Colin Marshall sits down in Los Angeles' Koreatown with filmmaker Rob Montz, director of Juche Strong, a short documentary about North Korea and its propaganda. They discuss reaching the same age as Kim Jong-un without a hermit kingdom to rule; the question of why North Koreans continue to believe in their state, despite having good reason not to; his early fascination with North Korea's World Cup showing, and how pursuing that fascination led him from standard opinions on the country to newer, more interesting ones; his realization that North Korean ideology comes built upon the same basic structures of psychological truth that any of us have; his interviewing of experts on North Korea, and their disagreements about the nature of the Juche idea; his trip to Pyongyang, and how it didn't require him to hide underwater from North Korean commandos, breathing through a reed; the state's aspirations to totalitarian watchfulness, and how incompetence shatters that image right at the airport; the boredom a visitor t