Jeonju film festival to turn lens on martial law crisis

A scene from the documentary “The Longest Night: Namtaeryeong" / Courtesy of Jeonju International Film Festival

This year’s Jeonju International Film Festival, set to run from April 29 to May 8, will shine a spotlight on films dealing with 2024’s martial law declaration, an event that plunged Korea into its deepest constitutional crisis in decades.

The festival named "The Longest Night: Namtaeryeong" as its closing film, a documentary by director Kim Hyun-ji, who previously earned widespread praise for "A Man Who Heals the City” (2023).

The festival's program notes introduce the film with a striking line — "A year has passed since a madman's scheme was foiled."

The reference is to President Yoon Suk Yeol’s surprise declaration of martial law on the night of Dec. 3, 2024, when armed soldiers entered the National Assembly grounds in an attempted insurrection. The crisis was nullified within around six hours after lawmakers convened an emergency session and voted to lift the decree.

"Namtaeryeong" focuses not on that night itself but on events two weeks later, on Dec. 21, when protesters made their stand near Namtaeryeong in southern Seoul.

Moon Seok, programmer of the film festival, said a striking feature of those protests was the overwhelming presence of women in their 20s and 30s.

"The film makes you angry, warms your heart, moves you and makes you laugh out loud," he said during a press conference in Seoul, Tuesday.

The festival will screen 237 films from 54 countries, comprising 97 Korean and 140 international titles. Kent Jones' "Late Fame" has been selected as the opening film.

Several other films also addressed the Dec. 3 crisis. "The Seoul Guardians,” produced by MBC broadcaster’s documentary team, reconstructs events inside and around the National Assembly using footage from dozens of cameras, drawing a parallel to the May 1980 Gwangju Uprising.

Director Mun Jeong-hyun, known for “Yongsan” (2010), returns with “Dark Beginnings,” spanning the period from the impeachment of former President Park Geun-hye through the removal of Yoon, mapping what the filmmaker sees as Korea's persistent cycles of hatred and social division.

Moon said fewer documentaries about Dec. 3 were submitted than expected, and even fewer fiction films.

"There are the structural constraints of fiction filmmaking," he said, predicting that narrative features on the crisis would begin appearing at next year's festival.

A special retrospective is also planned for the late Ahn Sung-ki, the beloved actor who died in January, the organizer added.