On Sep 22, 2016 - Holding its opening ceremony today (September 22, 2016) at the Camp Greaves in Paju, the 8th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival (DMZ Docs 2016) will run for 8 days through September 29th, 2016 in 3 cities and a county including Goyang, Paju, Gimpo and Yeoncheon in Gyeonggi-do Province, featuring 116 select films from 36 countries.
As it will be held at the Camp Greaves, the military base returned by the U.S. Army located in the southern civilian access control zone, for the third time since its launch, the opening ceremony of the international film festival is positioning as a unique event that cannot be experienced in any other film festivals.
The opening ceremony will be attended by over 700 persons, including Governor Nam Gyeong-pil of Gyeonggi-do, Cho Jae-hyun, executive director of the festival, popular actors, actresses, film directors, guests and audiences. A part of attendees at the opening ceremony will participate in the familiarization tour program of the DMZ on the following day after staying overnight at the Camp Greaves Youth Hostel.
Other important attendees at the opening ceremony include Mayor Choi Sung of Goyang who is vice chairman of organizing committee of the festival, Mayor Lee Jae-hong of Paju, Mayor Yoo Young-rok of Gimpo, Heo Jin-ho, chairman of executive committee of the Jecheon International Music and Film Festival, film director Jin Mo-yeong (‘My Lover, Don’t Cross That River’) and film director Oh Myeol (‘Jiseul’).
Under the theme of peace, communication and life, the opening ceremony of the DMZ Docs 2016 is designed to manifest its identity as a representative Asian documentary film festival.
Conducted over by Daniel Lindermann, former German representative to a popular TV program, ‘Abnormal Summit’, and Lee Seol-mi, a young defector from North Korea, as masters of ceremony, the opening ceremony will feature colorful programs, such as a video produced by students of the elementary school in Daeseong-dong, the northern most village in the civilian access control zone, concert of Lindenbaum Orchestra, which is organizing a ‘joint youth orchestra of South and North Korea’, and performance by the ‘Hana Unification Expedition Choir’, a choir of youths defected from North Korea.
The full-length documentary film ‘One Warm Spring Day’ debuted by Director Chung Su-eun is selected as the opening film to be screened following the opening ceremony. Selection of ‘One Warm Spring Day’ is significant as it was produced with a financial support of the promising documentary film director program last year. Through the journey of exploring fragmented life of his maternal grandfather who took part in the Korean War as a North Korean solider, Director Chung attempted to look into the history of tragedy on the Korean peninsula, while recording and remembering torturous life of those people who lived on the borderline of history as ‘prisoners of war’.
Having started in 2009 with the concept of ‘The Encounter of DMZ Located in World’s Only Divided Country with Documentary Films’, the DMZ International Documentary Film Festival this year records the largest number of entries in its history (1,290 films from 105 countries), while admission tickets for many films were already sold out in advance (3,500 tickets for 14 films), demonstrating heated interest than ever before. Undoubtedly, the festival is expected to serve as an occasion of communicating with audiences through diverse documentary films from across the world and of identifying present state of superior Korean documentary works.
Sections that attract keen attention in the film festival this year include the ‘DMZ Vision’ section that features works of depicting the situation of territorial division and projecting prospect for unification, and the ‘Specially Designed Film Show’ that introduces documentary films from Japan, China and Taiwan, which recorded stories of Japanese military comfort women. These films will be shown at major movie theaters, including Mega Box Baekseok, Mega Box in Paju Book City, Gimpo Art Hall, and Sureul Art Hall in Yeoncheon.
Scenes of the opening ceremony of the 8th DMZ International Documentary Film Festival (DMZ Docs 2016) will be telecasted live via the channel of OBS at 19:00 p.m. of the same day for 40 minutes.
