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Title: Anarchism through the Silver Screen
Author: CrimethInc.
Date: November 9, 2017
Language: en
Topics: film, Korea, film review
Source: Retrieved on 23rd April 2021 from https://crimethinc.com/2017/11/09/korean-anarchism-through-the-silver-screen-what-are-anarchists-doing-in-korean-films-today

CrimethInc.

Anarchism through the Silver Screen

This year, several major films from South Korea depict rebels or

outright anarchists. Okja portrays the Animal Liberation Front;

Anarchist from Colony tells the story of Park Yeol and Fumiko Kaneko,

two anarchist nihilists who have become national heroes in Korea; A Taxi

Driver dramatizes the Gwanju uprising of 1980. Why are anarchists

suddenly appearing in Korean cinema? What’s the context behind these

films? And how can they inform how we frame our own narratives in a time

of resurgent nationalism and unrest?

---

South Korea, 2017. The new year arrived with a surge of demonstrations

expressing disgust at the state of the nation. “Is this a/our country?”

went a popular slogan. The state apparatus played for time by starting

the impeachment process. Aspiring politicians worked hard to frame the

events as a “democratic revolution” (what an oxymoron!) and the massive

demonstrations were pacified, accepting the authority of the police and

the ordinary violence of daily life under this system. Then, pro-regime

reactionaries gained momentum fighting with the police in the name of

law and order and patriotism. Nevertheless, perhaps fearing that the

ruling order was becoming too unstable, the court announced the

impeachment of the president, who is now facing charges. Elections took

place, raising a new government to power.

Things are back to normal, it seems. However, the theater screens have

been filled with more revolt than usual. Indeed, this summer, at the

theater in my small Korean town, among the few movies presented, I could

watch back-to-back two Korean movies featuring anarchists in the

spotlight, preceded by a preview for yet another movie about the Gwangju

uprising.

What’s going on? This is out of the ordinary. It probably reflects

something happening in the popular consciousness on some level, but I

see no anarchist surge in the streets. What do we do when anarchism is

more visible on the screens than in the streets, when it is recuperated

by production companies with budgets that dwarf our scant resources? To

begin to answer these difficult questions, though I am hardly an expert

on Korean cinema, I’ll try to situate these recent movies in context to

see what they reveal about how anarchism is perceived here today. As

anarchism and nationalism have historically been closely intertwined in

Korea, this also brings me to discuss nation as narration.

Okja

Okja portrays the relationship between a young Korean and a pig, which

is interrupted by a multinational corporation and one of its enemies,

the Animal Liberation Front (ALF). Over a decade ago, the same director

released The Host, (2006), which explored the themes of state negligence

and deception and of rebellion through direct action. It was followed in

2014 by a large-scale international production, Snowpiercer, that

depicts a rebellion in a futuristic dystopian class society. Okja is a

continuation on these themes of rebellion—and also the result of

expanding Korean international cultural production.

The relationship between the ALF and anarchism is not explicit in the

movie, but the depiction of the ALF, though somewhat contradictory,

points in an anarchist direction. The movie shows sympathy for a group

engaged in anonymous illegal direct action and emphasizes how this could

spread in a decentralized way. It’s refreshing and funny to see a young

Korean employee turn his precarious conditions against his boss when he

refuses to chase the ALF truck, pointing out that, unlike his boss, he

has no insurance benefits—and thus no reason to endanger himself for the

sake of “his” company. As revealed in the last scene (hidden after the

credits), he eventually joins the ALF. This scene depicts the spreading

of rebellion: as the activists put on their black masks, a bystander who

is initially shocked to realize she is surrounded by them is then

comforted by being offered a mask too.

However, the viewers might get a contradictory impression of the ALF as

a standard hierarchical membership organization in the scene where

someone from the group (“the leader”) authoritatively expels another and

claims ownership of the ALF name. We never see another cell of the ALF

throughout the movie, either. The question of how to preserve “our”

integrity (at different levels ranging from affinity groups to

leaderless decentralized movements) is already a complex one and this

movie might confuse it more for people, making ALF activists appear

strict and purist. We also see activists struggling over questions of

dietary choice, non-violence, and consent.

The ALF is portrayed as a crew of friendly, silly, utopian youth from

the West. Though they include a Korean-American (who makes mistakes due

to misadjustment to both cultures), the rest of them are all white

Westerners operating in English without apparent ties in Korea. The

movie makes translation into an important theme. The plot revolves

around a mistranslation but this event is also followed immediately by a

deliberate mistranslation in the subtitles (something that can only be

noticed by someone speaking both languages). The English subtitle for

the spoken Korean “My name is Koo Soon-Bum” is “How is my Korean? Learn

English, Mija. It opens new doors.” The ALF leader that kicks his

Korean-American comrade out of the organization because of his deceiving

translation does so saying “Translation is sacred.” Later, the

translator makes a return with a tattoo on his arm saying “Translations

are sacred.”

In Okja as in other recent movies, we are presented with anarchism lite:

the anarchists fight creatively against the authorities to create a

better world, yet in the end the chief object of their “direct” action

is to reveal some evil to the public eye. The ALF is not shown directly

incapacitating corporations, only attacking their image. The

corporation’s leadership is shown in a conflict about the management of

their image. In the end, the boss who is concerned about presenting a

greenwashed and multicultural façade is replaced by her sister, who

rejects this approach in favor of the “traditional” corporate approach

to profiting through brute force.

A Taxi Driver

This movie is set during the Gwangju Uprising of May 1980, a weeks-long

insurrection that chased the authorities out of the South Korean city of

Gwangju and created a commune that has inspired resistance throughout

the dark years since.

I would like to explore an idea with you, dear comrades. For me, it can

be strategically useful to make a distinction between a “nation” (i.e.,

a people, a tribe, a group) on one hand and nationalism and statism on

the other. What if we understood a nation basically as a collective

identity built upon a narrative—in other words, as a story?

This storytelling involves crucial historical or mythical events. It is

a complex process, with different voices and different versions of the

story competing with and responding to each other. It is constantly

reproduced, challenged, and modified by a variety of forces. The forces

that compete to build and control the state and dominate society (or,

for that matter, the whole world through capitalism) try to shape this

narrative in a way that is advantageous to them. Perhaps we anarchists

also aim at building some kind of collective power and for that purpose

need some form of identity—not centralized but nevertheless somehow

consistent? If so, we might intervene better on this terrain if we

consider which events are emphasized and which are ignored, by whom, and

how.

With this objective in mind, let us look at A Taxi Driver and this

year’s other major film about rebellion, Anarchist from Colony.

The events of May 1980 in Gwangju appear of crucial importance if we are

to resonate with people here in Korea. After being censored for a decade

by the authorities, these events were re-presented by the democratic

“opposition” that got into office at the end of the 1990s. When the

“conservatives” got back into government, they kept commemorating the

events but in a toned down way. On May 18, 2017, with the new government

“born of the candlelight revolution,” the commemoration resumed its

previous scale and tone. Which politician does or does not sing along

with the uprising’s “anthem” became the focus of attention.

Other movies have made these events their setting, including May

18/Magnificient Vacation and A Petal. Both share a kind of narration

that focuses on individuals involved in a drama. A Taxi Driver is based

on the real experience of an actual taxi driver who accidentally got

involved in the course of driving a foreign journalist around—note again

how much importance is given to the Western media gaze.

What seems to be missing in these movies (which I haven’t seen) is a

view of the commune born through these events, a glimpse at how people

self-organized and strategized. What seems to be needed is a way to

compellingly tell a story, going beyond documentary and fiction, that

makes things personal yet not in the usual atomized and static sense. Of

course, different movies can serve different purposes—some to remember,

some to analyze, some focusing on a micro-level, some on a macro-level.

Anarchist from Colony

This movie is set during the period that comprises the foundation of the

nation building narrative for the Korean state, not to mention a whole

Korean historical movie genre: the era of Japanese colonialism that

began at the opening of the 20^(th) century and lasted until the end of

the World War II. This period has served this function since the

establishment of the current Korean state—but I’d be curious to know how

the role of anarchists in this narrative has changed over the years.

Anarchists have played an important role in the narrative for some time

now. Over a decade ago, a movie entitled Anarchists was released,

depicting anarchist resistance in the aforementioned era. Anarchist

ideas hardly appeared in that action movie, except in the form of

assassination attempts against the colonial authorities. However, in the

last few years, several successful movies have appeared depicting

resistance at that time, involving a variety of protagonists of diverse

visions, genders, and ethnicities, including anarchist characters:

Assassination, The Age of Shadows, and Dongju, to name three examples.

The first two are action and spy thrillers, whereas the last one,

Dongju, by the same director as Anarchist from Colony, deals with the

more complex themes of individualism, art, and resistance.

Both the North Korean and South Korean states compete to present

themselves as the heirs of the resistance (i.e., independence) movement

under Japanese colonialism and the reincarnation of the Korean nation in

a modern democratic form. In this regard, one could say that the South

Korean state occupies a disadvantageous position compared to the North

Korean regime, in that South Korea is in an indirect military alliance

with Japan (through the USA) against North Korea.

There are contradictory tensions within the public over this subject. On

one hand, there’s widespread support for military defense against North

Korea; on the other hand, the close alliance with the USA and Japan is

very controversial. Lately, as is common regarding small, uninhabited

islands in the seas bordering the east coast of Asia, there is a

territorial dispute, in this case between Korea and Japan. The South

Korean state boasts of taking a hard line to defend Korean territory and

there is a citizens’ movement about taking pride in these islands, that

could also be seen as nothing more than big rocks. There has been a

widespread discontent about the lenient way that the most recent

governments have dealt with contentious issues with Japan regarding

historical recognition and reparations related to sex trade during

colonial times.

In Japan too, an extreme-right (some say fascist) government has

recently returned to power, accompanied by a xenophobic movement. There

are many ethnic Koreans and Chinese living in Japan with a complex and

changing citizenship status.[1]

State relations between China and Japan are also worsening, as are

relations between South Korea and China. (Indeed, even North Korea may

be on worsening terms with China.) Although the two countries share

geographic proximity and historic and economic ties, and a considerable

number of Chinese immigrants live in South Korea, many (South) Koreans

subjectively feel estranged from China, and hostility towards its

government. Lately, a punk event has taken place in different countries

including participants from across Asia (mainly from Japan, Taiwan,

China, and South Korea), but it, too, was torn by conflicts having to do

with gender, race, history, and subcultural politics. To me, all of this

contrasts with what seems like a greater degree of internationalism in

the resistance movements during the era portrayed in Anarchist From

Colony.

A hundred years ago, anarchists in the entire Northeast Asia

region—Korea, Japan, and China, including connections with Russia—played

a major role in the resistance to Japanese colonialism. This presents a

difficulty for any narrative about Korean state-building that seeks to

conceal the role of anarchists in the events. Furthermore, in the South,

where anti-communism has been of central importance to the state,

anarchists’ clear opposition to state-communism makes them appealing to

common people in general, but also as targets to be integrated into

state-building narratives. Numerous anarchists are revered by the state

and society in general, appearing in textbooks and public monuments as

heroes and martyrs for the nation. Yeol Park and Fumiko Kaneko, the

anarchist protagonists of Anarchist from Colony, are among them.

There are other reasons anarchists have been attractive to filmmakers

lately, which can be both an advantage and an obstacle to the spread of

anarchism. In contrast with the boredom of daily life under capitalism,

movie anarchists often stand out for being active—but this activity is

spectacular and aggressive in superficial ways (think guns and bombs).

The action movie genre demands this: in a short time, the film must

remove spectators from their daily lives and get their bodies pumping

adrenaline. Unfortunately, this image could overshadow the diverse forms

that anarchism can take in everyday life, especially the aspects

involving attention, creativity, and care.

Refreshingly, in the movie Dongju, an anarchist freedom fighter

encourages Dongju (criticized for his apolitical individualism) to “Keep

on writing poems while I keep fighting with the gun.” A related

problematic aspect of the recent notoriety of anarchists comes of them

being fashionable, being exceptional yet somehow well-adjusted

characters. This is something like conformist anti-conformism: in the

movies, the anarchists are often savvy, sexy, and bold characters who

also blend in and navigate perfectly well in cosmopolitan settings in

their society. This is all well and good, but one must bear in mind how

it relates to the marketing of “original” individual and global consumer

identities and politics. Understanding it as an identity label with

these narratives in mind, “anarchist” appears to many as a spectacular

ideal far out of reach of ordinary mortals. Many good people I know will

not identify themselves as anarchists because they feel unworthy of the

title or consider it too exotic or ideological. Eschewing labels is

fine, but when this means that they do not engage in outreach or

organizing, either, it turns out that the movie version of the anarchist

has served to inoculate the population against real-life anarchism.

At best, when they show anarchists’ contradictions and imperfections,

some of these films might help some people understand that anarchists

are people like themselves. For that reason, humor is a great tool and

an important aspect of anarchy.

To cite an example of such contradictions, in Anarchist from Colony, we

witness Yeol acting without pridefulness, calling himself a dog—yet

later, in court, he insists on speaking Korean and, with Fumiko, on

being dressed up like the king and queen of Korea. Bear in mind that

these are self-professed nihilists. It is also funny because this

costume is traditionally worn by common people only the day of their

wedding. Their comrades joke that they turned their trial into their

wedding.

When anarchists are represented in state-building narratives, their

anarchism is toned down in favor of their nationalism, and this

nationalism is used to foster a tacit approval of the reigning

nation-state. This translation/deformation is possible because of

confusion induced by the concept of nationalism (which has a very

positive connotation in Korea). Nationalism can involve a stance against

a specific ethnic oppression and an affinity among the oppressed toward

collective liberation, but it also comes with an implicit assumption

that this liberation will take the form of a new and democratic state.

Indeed, many of the self-proclaimed Korean anarchists of the past,

having never experienced democracy, seemed to be unclear about the

issue, believing in some form of democracy. This is still very much a

problem; the critique of democracy is necessary and timely here.

Nevertheless, of all the “Korean” anarchists I know, the story of Yeol

Park and Kaneko Fumiko has the greatest potential to upset the standard

nationalist narrative. First of all, at least in some of their writings,

they made their nihilism explicit, rejecting all ideologies and nations.

Secondly, they were part of a minority within the resistance. Although

it has been argued that until the mid-1920s in East Asia, anarchism was

the dominant current of socialism, later anarchists were violently

attacked by authoritarians of all stripes and became isolated and

forgotten. This pattern played out in many different parts of the world.

Even among anarchists, the majority being of a more communist tendancy,

Yeol and Fumiko’s individual and nihilist anarchism was a minority.

In the recent movies and especially in Anarchist from Colony, it is

interesting to see these differences and conflicts within the resistance

movement portrayed. In the movie, we see Yeol and his comrades demanding

accountability and confronting another member of the independence

movement. The latter, a person of greater social status, looks down upon

them, demanding to know the name of their party. Yeol hesitates and asks

his friend about their name. The friend says “Yesterday, our name was

‘Patriots’ but today we are the ‘Kick Your Ass Party.’” This response

shows that they do not care about the name or the status of their

organization. Indeed, they have used a great diversity of names for

their organizations and publications. The name used in the movie refers

just to the place, a kind of restaurant, where they hang out; it is a

play on words recuperating an insult thrown at them.

The last and perhaps most important way that their story that can upset

the standard nationalist narrative is their obvious internationalism.

Yeol was ethnically Korean, but he lived in Japan, struggling alongside

Japanese comrades. Fumiko, even though she was raised in Korea, was not

an ethnic Korean. Many, including Fumiko’s lawyer, have tried to paint

her as a virtuous women that sacrificed herself for her husband and his

nation. Anyone who honestly undertakes to learn about her will see just

the opposite: she lived to the fullest for no one other than herself.

She can certainly upset the narrative of the submissive and passive

women. See Treacherous Women from Imperial Japan; Patriarchal Fictions,

Patricidal Fantasies.

Though the Korean movie title for Anarchist from Colony is “Yeol Park,”

the name of her male comrade, this is likely a trick. Many have argued

that the movie makes Fumiko into the main protagonist. At least, the

actress attracted much attention by performing very well. Contrary to my

expectations, based on reading her writings, of Fumiko as extremely

angry and serious, the actress brought out a contrasting lightness in

her character. The words spoken in the court scenes are for the most

part the exact words that were used by Yeol and Fumiko. Indeed, by going

through with their trial, they made sure their words were recorded and

diffused widely. At the time, their trial and their especially defiant

stance generated much attention. Furthermore, Fumiko used her time in

prison to write her memoirs, answering the question “what made me what I

am?” Her writings (in English, The Prison Memoirs of a Japanese Woman)

have been re-edited and she enjoys a renewed popularity with the recent

release of the movie. Coinciding with the recent boom of feminism in

Korea, Fumiko is a bomb, inspiring to many.

I liked that the movie brings out the rebellious, irreverent, and joyful

side of anarchy. However, here again, it seems we end up with anarchism

lite, liberal anarchism—though this may be an inescapable consequence of

making a movie that focuses almost exclusively on a court case.

It is nice to see people ridiculing the justice system and using it in

ways not expected by the authorities. For example, Park gains some

important concessions by threatening to forgo his right to a trial and

going on hunger strike, recognizing that the authorities need the trial

to take place to legitimize their rule. By taking the offensive on a

level not expected by the authorities, Yeol and Fumiko constantly

destabilize their adversaries. However, ultimately, this strategy of

using the courts to shed light on atrocities is limited and can easily

be confused with liberalism—note, once again, the recurring theme of

seeking the gaze of the media and the “international” community, which

is to say, the Western community. We cannot see anarchism clearly

through the lens of legal proceedings. The movie reminds of the recent

movement to shed light on the “Seweol-ho” ferry incident, or the “9/11

Truth” movement alleging a cover-up in the attacks on the World Trade

Center in New York. The truth is never simple or easy to reveal; nor

would doing so necessarily lead to positive social change. Anarchists

must communicate, yes, but our actions must not be limited to speech

represented in institutions like the court and the media.

Shortly after her death sentence was transmuted to a life sentence,

Fumiko Kaneko died in prison, officially from suicide. When she received

the letter announcing the imperial pardon, she tore it up in anger, and

made it clear to the authorities that she had no intention of letting

anyone else determine her fate. She wrote to her judge that it was

ridiculous to try to force a person to live when she does not wish

to—that is to say, to serve a life sentence in prison. She believed that

life in itself has no value except as a choice in front of death: that

it is affirmed through its negation. Yeol may have agreed with her, but

he made the opposite choice: despite learning of the suicide of his

lover and comrade, despite there being no sign that either the regime or

his imprisonment would ever come to an end, he survived more than 20

years in prison. His captors harassed him by telling him to live long

and forgotten.

Yeol came out of jail when the Japanese empire collapsed. The movie ends

without mention of his intriguing life after his release.[2]

In this movie, it seems Yeol represents the role of the memory keeper.

This begs the question: remembering for whom and why? As we have seen,

anarchists have sometimes been ignored and sometimes remembered, for

good and for ill, portrayed negatively and now positively. Let’s not get

distracted. Let’s remember for ourselves, in order to pursue our

objectives, and take advantage of whatever opportunities the situation

presents.

Now, imagine yourself part of a broad international anarchist movement.

You are in the belly of the beast, at the center of an empire. At your

sides are comrades from diverse origins, displaced people and

immigrants. A catastrophic natural disaster takes place, unfolding into

a social disaster. A massive social upheaval, something you and your

comrades have plotted and waited for so long, seems just around the

corner. However, to your surprise, the social upheaval is transformed

into a mass movement of bigotry and fascism and genocidal acts are

carried out around you. This genocidal mob is after you but so are the

authorities, trying to find a scapegoat.

Sounds familiar? That is the kind of situation Yeol and Fumiko found

themselves in a hundred years ago. Arguably, the anarchist movement was

stronger then than it has ever been since, at least in East Asia. Now,

after a slump of decades, it’s coming back. Of course, all of this

depends on how you define anarchism, how you gauge strength and

understand diversity and resilience. Nevertheless, it is also valuable

to notice how movements ebb and flow and how history evolves as it

repeats itself.

History is a hot topic these days here in Asia. The government that was

toppled here in the spring had gambled on a project to revise the school

history curriculum, a risky business sure to provoke a massive reaction

and polarization. This was accompanied by a populist right-wing movement

pushing for nationalization against a supposed “left-ideology-dominated

monopolistic market of publishing companies.” Though apparently not as

strong in Korea as in other parts of the world, fascists are regaining

momentum by invoking the past. If we find ourselves facing the same

situation as Yeol and Fumiko did, we have to take up the challenge and

repeat history, better, double or nothing, once again.

[1] The Japanese government has always been basically right-wing in

terms of political ideology, while its economic policy was generally

developmentalist and protectionist toward its industry and functioned to

create a welfare state for its population. Since the 1980s, it has made

a gradual turn toward neoliberalism; the rise of extreme-right wing

politicians coincided with this trend. This genealogy culminates with

Shinzo Abe. His first term as prime minister in was short lived due to

scandals and health issues, but he came back in 2012, after the Democrat

who took power in 2009 lost public confidence with a series of political

mismanagements and missteps, the principal of which, in the public eye,

was a wishy-washy stance toward the nuclear power after the Fukushima

disaster. Abe not only denies the atrocities committed by the Japanese

Imperial Army but glorifies what they have done in Asia, making him an

ultra-nationalist and revisionist. His rise to power coincided with a

deluge of neo-racism originating on internet bulletin boards. In the few

years since the mid-2000s, racists began to stage threatening street

demonstrations targeting ethnic minorities and nationalities, especially

Korean and Chinese people.

[2] I know from other sources that he wrote about the danger of the Cold

War and the division of Korea. I do not know if he was still an

anarchist then, when he supported the creation of the South Korean state

and its right-wing anti-communist pro-USA leadership. When the Korean

War broke out, he was supposedly abducted by North Korean forces and

lived more than 20 more years in North Korea, of which we know almost

nothing.