COMMERCIAL
My Hometown Means the Sea
MY HOMETOWN MEANS THE SEA: A NORTH KOREAN DEFECTOR’S POEM is a short film that has been commissioned by the Washington Post. The film was part of Anna Fifield’s in-depth story on North Korean defectors, who made a living in Seoul.
The film portraits young poet Eun-jeong Oh (26), who left Kyongsong (on the east coast just south of Chongjin in North Korea) in 2009. In an interview with Anna Fifield she describes her life back home and how she ended up writing poetry:
“My dad was a sailor, and he had alcohol problems, but still, I had a happy childhood. I used to swim in the sea every morning and every afternoon after school. My forehead was always white because of the salt from the sea. But then my mom left and my father was killed in a traffic accident, and my sister, who is 11 years younger than me, went to live with our grandma. I was living by myself in our family house. Then in 2009, I escaped, too. In North Korea, I had read only one novel, which I’d borrowed from a neighbor. It was all torn and there were pages missing, but it was all I had. In South Korea, I was always reading. At college, I discovered a wonderful Korean literature professor whose way of teaching was very emotional, and I ended up taking three classes with him. The whole time, I was writing down little notes in my phone. I didn’t even know that the notes I was writing were poetry. I was just scribbling spontaneously.”
“One fall day, I saw a maple tree with red burning foliage on campus. It was so beautiful, but I knew it would all be gone by the following week. Thinking about that made me think of the last time I saw my sister. At the time, I didn’t even know what a metaphor was, I just wrote. The biggest motivation for me behind writing poetry was missing my sister so much. I was so full of hurt, I was overflowing with hurt, and I had to let it out onto the page. It was a whole new world to me. I felt like each cell in my body was coming to life. My first book came out in 2015. It’s called “Calling Home.” I was invited onto a TV channel, and I gave poetry readings. That’s how I was selected as a rising poet, and I was asked to contribute to another collection. A lot of my works are related to North Korea. I have such fond memories of there. Even though there is oppression, there were also moments of happiness, and I don’t have to deny those times. People are hungry and life is hard, but the essence of humanity is the same.”
I would like to thank MIN JOO KIM, JOYCE LEE, JESSE MESNER-HAGE who together produced the film, UDO LEE, who recorded sound and ERIN PARICK O’CONNOR, who edited and color graded the film. The music is by APM MUSIC.
Bikini Words at Arlington Film Festival
Bikini Words at The Arlington International Film Festival
We are incredibly honored to announce that BIKINI WORDS by Nils Clauss will screen in the International Shorts Program of the 8th annual Arlington International Film Festival. The festival takes place from November 1st to November 4th 2018 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
About BIKINI WORDS
BIKINI WORDS is the first film of a Korea related trilogy, which is followed by LAST LETTERS and PLASTIC GIRLS. What unites the 3 films is a strong focus on issues related to space and architecture, but each film itself stands out with an individual subject matter. BIKNI WORDS talks about new vocabulary that evolved during the rapid industrialisation of South Korea throughout the 1970s and 1980s amongst the factory workers to put names to the radically new aspects of their urbanised lives.
To date BIKINI WORDS has screened at several international film festival and won Best Short Documentary at the Lift-Off Season Awards 2016.
For more information about BIKINI WORDS please read a very thorough interview on film blog DIRECTORS NOTES, which dives into some of the ideas behind and the making of this film.
Screening Time
BIKINI WORDS will screen in the International Shorts Program along with the CLASH OF MORALITY by Vinay Pujara, CUBEMAN by Linda Dombrovsky, LIFE AFTER GUANTANAMO by Esteban Cuevas and DANKE by Antonio Sequeria:
* Fri, Nov 2nd, 9:28 PM at Capital Theatre – 204 Massachusetts Ave, Arlington, MA 02474, USA
For more information about screening times, venues and the festival in general, please visit the ARLINGTON INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL website.
if … | Opening film World Congress of Architects
Being fathers of young kids ourselves, we get to see the creativity of our children up close every day. There is something precious about it. As Picasso said “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist as we grow up.”
We felt that the best way to respond to the call for ideas from the International Union of Architects (UIA), who wanted a film to open the 2017 World Congress of Architects in Seoul, was to take the attendees back to the beginning of their own creative journeys. To take a fun look at nerdy kids, the ones who can sit for hours, even in the age of the iPad, and become engrossed in their drawings and their lego and, ok so we’re back on the screens, their Minecraft worlds. Our aim was to revisit the creative spark in it’s purest form.
We decided we could tell this story best as a kind of inquiry using talking heads interviews to lend some authority to the children’s point of view. We used these interviews along with vignettes where we took some of the kids out into the city and engaged them somehow in an architecturally related task. We were keen to include kids from different parts of the world to reflect the international make-up of the audience. Luckily Seoul has also become so much more international that we were able to find all these kids who are growing up in the city. Many of them have been in Seoul for several years, they speak Korean as well as their mother tongue and go to school with Korean kids.
Seoul as a city is also a fantastic place for architectural diversity, with a great selection of historical, traditional, functional, residential, infrastructural and contemporary constructions to explore. Thank you very much for your interest if…!
Nils Clauss & Neil Dowling from CONTENTED
MINERVA | Global Immersion: Seoul
THE GLOBAL IMMERSION SERIES
Founded in 2014, Minerva Schools is designed around a new vision of higher education that combines a reinvented curriculum, rigorous academic standards, innovative technology, and an immersive global experience. Students study in seven different cities over the course of four years, where they engage with local civic partners to apply classroom knowledge to practical, real-world problems. The above film is part of a series directed by LA based Andrew Hida in collaboration with Minerva’s Creative Director Ayo Seligman. As part of CONTENTED, Nils Clauss and Mini Kim had the pleasure to work with Andrew and Ayo together on the Seoul instalment of this global video series.
“Global Immersion: Seoul” is a short film, which highlights how classroom curriculum extends into the urban fabric and shapes their personal, professional and academic growth. As part of a broader marketing campaign a series of 60-second cuts were also produced for social media engagement.
BRIEF
The target audiences of this series are prospective students and the parents of these students who are seeking to better understand the Minerva global experience. Andrew and Ayo describe how they wanted the viewer to understand the full spectrum of daily life, from the demanding academics, to the immersive social and co-curricular activities. The goal was to make a film which quickly convinces the viewer why they belong at Minerva by telling the story of how the Minerva experience stands apart from that of the traditional university through personal stories of challenge and growth.
CHALLENGES AND RESULT
Over the course of two years, Andrew and Ayo have directed the first four short films in the Global Immersion series. Andrew says that each subsequent episode pushes deeper into stories of personal and professional development as they come into their own. Instead of replicating the same mold for each episode, the storyline instead evolves in parallel to student growth and an evolving world view. This distinct approach enabled Andrew together with Minerva to build on existing story and expand on emotional impact.
In order to achieve the authentic, cinematic documentary style that defines the Minerva brand, Minerva and Andrew say that they assembled a team of cinematographers with a strong background in visual journalism. They further note that weeks of creative design and pre-production proved essential to manage the complex timing and logistics of multiple shooters and photographers, navigating large, foreign cities.
For us at CONTENTED, it was great to take part in this great and meaningful project and we are glad that we were able to offer our services with Nils Clauss as the Director of Photography and Mini Kim as the local producer for the above film. We would like to thank Ayo, Andrew and everyone at Minerva for all their great support.
JOURNEY TO LADAKH. A Samsung Promo
Three different characters on a journey through the rugged beauty of the Himalayan landscape in and around the town of Leh. As their paths cross we are shown how technology and tradition go hand in hand in this remote part of the world.
CONTENTED is very excited to get the opportunity to work on this project both in terms of working in India and with a big brand like Samsung. None of us had been to India before. Ladakh may not be the India that comes immediately to mind for most people, but it was an extremely evocative place all the same with so much to fascinate and inspire us.
First we had to shake the altitude sickness and figure out how to walk up a flight of stairs without being completely out of breath. After that we could easily see what makes Ladakh and the town of Leh such a popular starting point for visitors who want to explore the Himalayas.
As well as the simple storylines that we had outlined beforehand, we were very keen to capitalise on the character and flavour of the place. We were ably assisted in this by teaming up with an experienced local support team. They pointed us in the right direction and shared some of the many secrets of their home town with us.
We wanted to show in a subtle way how Samsung has a presence even in the most remote communities around the world and how that presence can co-exist without having an adverse effect on the local culture and way of life.
We hope we have succeeded and that you enjoy our film.
MILLET. M LIMITED S/S 2016
This is a short video produced by CONTENTED, directed by Jean-Julien Pous and shot by Nils Clauss. The video was made for M Limited Spring Summer 2016, a sportswear division of Millet.
Best Short Documentary for Bikini Words
Great News! BIKINI WORDS by Nils Clauss just won Best Short Documentary at the Liverpool Lift-Off Film Festival 2016!
As a winner BIKINI WORDS will now be screened at proceeding Lift-Off global film festival events in Tokyo (in April), Las Vegas (June), Vancouver (August), Los Angeles (September), Amsterdam (October), Singapore (Late October), Sydney (November), and London (December).
BIKINI WORDS on THE ATLANTIC
After the short documentary Choa now also Bikini Words has been featured as an Editor’s Pick by The Atlantic. Thanks to Nadine Ajaka for showcasing the video!
BIKINI WORDS takes a look at new linguistic developments among factory workers during the industrial expansion of Korea in the 1970s and 80s.
VIMEO STAFF PICK for Bikini Words
GREAT NEWS! BIKINI WORDS has been selected as a VIMEO STAFF PICK. This totals 5 Staff Picks during the past 5 years! So far VIMEO has been an amazing platform and I am truly thankful for all their support. Also I would like to thank everyone, who has been actively supporting me as a filmmaker. All those collaborations throughout the years have been very inspirational and taught me a hell of a lot. A big shout-out to everyone involved!