[INTERVIEW] Documentary 'Free Chol Soo Lee' revisits landmark Asian American movement

The documentary "Free Chol Soo Lee" tells the story of a wrongfully convicted man in the 1970s. Courtesy of Connect Pictures

By Lee Gyu-lee

For Chol Soo Lee, a Korean American immigrant in San Francisco, 1973 was the year that turned his life completely upside down, going from a 21-year-old street punk to being wrongfully convicted of murder, spending 10 years in prison.

Lee was found guilty of the murder of a man in Chinatown following a racially profiled arrest and trial that only had three white visitors as witnesses, leaving many flaws in the case. He received life imprisonment, followed by death row for defending himself against a fellow inmate during his sentence.

Julie Ha and Eugene Yi, makers of the documentary "Free Chol Soo Lee" / Courtesy of Connect Pictures

The injustice he faced ignited an unprecedented pan-Asian movement that went on for years until his exoneration when the Sacramento Union's investigative reporter K.W. Lee brought his case to the surface.

A new documentary, "Free Chol Soo Lee" directed by Julie Ha and Eugene Yi, revisits this historic case, delving deep into the flawed justice system and the Asian community's unprecedented solidarity movement that helped set him free. The film, which premiered at Sundance last year, is set to open in Korea on Oct. 18.

The directors, who first came across the case through K.W., said they felt the story deserved public attention.

"Freeing a Korean immigrant from death row, it's an incredible story. It's such meaningful history but it was just totally forgotten. It wasn't taught and it felt like it should be," Yi said during an interview with The Korea Times in downtown Seoul, Wednesday.

Ha said learning about the case changed her life while interning for her journalism mentor K.W.

"It was very surprising to know at a young age that our American justice system was not just and that it could put an innocent man in prison. It changed my life … This was like a landmark, unprecedented Asian American movement in America," Ha said, adding she felt a huge emotion at Lee's funeral in 2014.

"It was at the funeral that I felt this heaviness. (It) has stayed with me for nine months. And it felt like the story needed to come out."

A scene from the documentary "Free Chol Soo Lee" / Courtesy of Connect Pictures

That's when the two journalists, with no background in documentary filmmaking, took a deeper look into Lee's life to tell his story, which they spent six years making.

"Free Chol Soo Lee" follows Lee's life from his birth, through the turbulent time of the Korean War and his upbringing in America with his single mother to the final years of his tragic life after he was set free from prison.

The narrative is enriched by Lee's self-written memoir, read aloud by Sebastian Yoon, who also helped the directors with scenes drawing on his own experience in prison, adding depth to the film. It presents extensive archival resources as well as interviews with the movement's activists and people involved in Lee's life.

Below is an excerpt from the interview with the co-directors, Ha and Yi, and the film's producer Su Kim. It has been edited for clarity and readability.

Q. How does it feel to finally release the film in Korea, the country where Chol Soo Lee was born?

Ha: It's a dream come true for us. This is where the story began and is where Chol Soo was born. He was a child of the Korean War. Back in the late 70s and early 80s, when the Free Chol Soo Lee movement started to gain attention, it reached the Korean people. The Korean people embraced him, and his story. They felt like he was one of them. So we knew maybe we could recapture that kind of connection between our film, Chol Soo Lee, and the Korean people.

Investigative reporter K.W. Lee, left, interviews Chol Soo Lee in prison. Courtesy of Connect Pictures

Kim: It was our No. 1 goal starting the movie. When I started, I asked the directors what are your goals? And one of the first ones we talked about was trying to release the film in South Korea.

My family immigrated (to America from Korea) in 1977 … I remember my mom telling me that she often would not tell her family that things were not easy sometimes to not get them worried. And when she watched the film, she said to me that she felt like that. It captured the story of the immigration of her generation.

This was a really bad situation, but there were many little things that I think people experienced at the time that you can feel in the film. And that's what I hope in the release in Korea that people can see that story and understand how difficult the migration was.

Q. Once you decided to make the documentary, what was the process like to develop his story into the film?

Yi: In America, because we are minorities there, it's not always that your stories are valued as much as it feels like they should be. So when we looked in those archives, there were some but there wasn't a lot of material. We ended up needing to rely on the community to find this archive. And so we both had this experience as journalists and a relationship with K.W., who just shared all this material with us.

It wasn't long before we saw that there would be enough for a film. And it was just really extraordinary to see the community do just that; create this community archive. And we truly just wouldn't have the film if it wasn't for the fact that they had preserved this material.

A still from the documentary "Free Chol Soo Lee" / Courtesy of Connect Pictures

Q. K.W. was one of the key figures in Chol Soo's case and the movement, dedicating many years of his career and life to proving Chol Soo's innocence and becoming a father figure to Chol Soo. What was his reaction when he saw the film?

Ha: K.W. Lee knew if people knew this, it could actually lead to positive change. It could change the way we look at each other and at people who are marginalized in society. Even though Chol Soo Lee was the victim of this injustice, he was not an angel as he says in the film. He had a criminal record at the time. Yet after this terrible racism happened to him, it drew the compassion and courage of a whole group of people (from conservative elders to politically progressive students) in America who, for the first time, united.

Q. The documentary puts heavy emphasis on the journey to get him exonerated, then it takes a turn, touching on his struggles afterward and how his life went downhill. How did you structure the overall narrative of the story?

A picture of Chol Soo Lee, center, with his legal team / Courtesy of Connect Pictures

Ha: Our main motivation for the film was we want to give Chol Soo Lee agency, finally, to be able to tell his own story in full, the full arc of his life from his birth to his death. And so that people, especially his supporters, could understand what his life was like even before and after the movement started. Even though he was tremendously grateful, how burdensome it was to know that you owe your life to a community of people. How do you ever repay them for something like that? They worked for six years to free him. So he carried that heavy burden.

We also believe that's why Chol Soo Lee wanted this chance to explain why it was so hard for him to overcome the demons from 10 years of incarceration at some of the most violent prisons in America.

We always worry that this case felt too messy for our community. Model minority is a myth that's enforced upon us by mainstream society. But sometimes I think we Asian Americans buy into it too … But we're asserting that "No, we need to know the full truth." And then we can learn so much from that truth.

The documentary "Free Chol Soo Lee" will be released in Korea on Oct. 18. Courtesy of Connect Pictures

Q. How did this process of making the documentary affect your life personally?

Yi: Some of the activists talked about how (the movie) gave them a sense of closure or gave them the ability to talk about the movement with a sense of pride in a way they hadn't been able to until now. I think sometimes you can talk about film or art as a space for healing … And I personally wasn't necessarily sure it's possible with our film. But just to see that has really changed my whole perspective on what a film can do.

Ha: This is quite personal but after year 2 of making this film I was diagnosed with breast cancer and it was a very traumatic, difficult experience … I remember having days where I just had trouble not giving up and I remember thinking about Chol Soo who suffered so much more than any human should have to in a lifetime. And I thought OK, I can get back up and keep fighting. He inspired me to want to just keep fighting.