a review of 意志之国

#74 (March 15/31) This is the second in the set of North Korea documentaries that I saw on Mubi. This was an interesting change of tone from the previous film, focusing more on the everyday lives of the actual residents of Pyongyang, specifically two schoolgirls going through strenuous training for the infamous Mass Games. The film's depiction of the girls and their families is heartbreaking, in that they are presented as being barely different from people elsewhere in the world, and the regime that they live under is both despicable and strangely recognizable in its nationalist mythology. It gave me some things to think about.