“I have no words of support for you as you’re responsible for handling this tragedy that must not be forgotten. Continue to feel guilty and blame yourself.”

In her first feature-length documentary, filmmaker Nam Arum turns her camera on her parents, two members of South Korea’s 386 Generation. The political activism of this generation came to a head in June 1987 with major protests that forced the authoritarian government to hold universal suffrage elections and implement key democratic reforms. Over 35 years later, the filmmaker reflects on the state of this democracy through a warm-hearted family portrait set against the backdrop of the country’s recent history. 

Using a personal and intimate cinematic style, Arum examines her father’s adherence to convention as a senior civil servant and her mother’s fervent enthusiasm as a feminist activist. In the midst of these two contrasting dynamics, Arum seeks to discover her own role and how she can contribute to social change.

With her first documentary, K-Family Affairs (애국소녀), the young South Korean director pulls off a coup: telling her country’s recent political history through her family reality.

Family history

I’ve often spoken out against those so-called documentaries that tell an uninteresting family story. And I still say it: a family story is not a relevant subject for a documentary. But… 

Although K-Family Affairs focuses on the director’s family, it’s mostly about the country’s politics, and the social changes that are happening or not happening. It has to be said that the young woman has an atypical family. Her father works for the government, while her mother is an activist who has spent most of her life attacking government practices. They met at university, while he was studying to be a journalist. 

The director doesn’t dwell on the decisive moment when the father decided to change his career plans to become a civil servant. But we sense that there was a great deal of tension at the time. But the couple decided to continue their relationship. Through the parents’ relationship, Arum deals with the fate of women in Korean society in the ’80s, as well as today.

Some sequences are more touching, even unsettling, especially for a parent. In one of the sequences, taken from family archives, we see the mother sitting on the floor with her two little twin daughters, less than 1 year old. The director tells us, in voice-over, that when she watched this video, she discovered a look in her mother’s eyes that she had never seen before. A deep sadness, an empty look of a woman who, now that she’s married and has children, finds herself obliged to leave her job and career to look after the children and the house. Because that’s how a woman should live in society. Even if a woman has the right to go back to work after having children, it’s strongly frowned upon. This look, then, which the director takes the time to show us, hints at all the sadness of a woman who dreams of “more” than just being a mother, a wife. 

Another sequence, just as difficult to bear, is shot by Arum. Against a background of sea and trees, she reads a letter she wrote to her father the previous year. An extremely harsh letter to the man she loves. In it, she refers to one of the country’s greatest tragedies, the sinking of the Sewol, when her father was in charge of this government department.

“Recently, many of the youth that you wanted to protect had their lives taken away from them. I have no words of support for you as you’re responsible for handling this tragedy that must not be forgotten. Continue to feel guilty and blame yourself. I hope this incident will remind you of why you became a civil servant in the first place. I believe that you are capable of building a trustworthy government instead of being its puppet.”

A tragedy that led to the deaths of 250 high school students. 

Which brings us to the political and historical aspect of the documentary.

Political history

Made up mainly of archive footage, this theme tells the story of how South Korea evolved over the course of fifty years, from a totalitarian regime to a democracy. 

The sinking of the Sewol is at the heart of the story, as it had a major impact on society and the family. The director explains how bad she felt being at school and having no one to cry to. That she felt she had to do something. That’s when she wrote that letter to her father. On two occasions, she tries to broach the subject with her father, who avoids answering each time. 

Her father is a man who places a great deal of emphasis on his role in government and, as such, must remain neutral and never give a political opinion. For his daughter, this is unacceptable.

There are also a few comical moments to lighten the narrative. For example, those tender moments when the twins celebrate their birthdays. The girls were born on the same day as the very first suffrage in this new democratic country. And since elections were held at fixed intervals, every 5 years, their birthdays fell on election day. Wasn’t this a sign of destiny that these girls should get involved in their society?

This anecdote is, of course, an excuse to bring up the monstrous demonstrations the country experienced in the 90s and 2000s. These included the demonstrations that led to the arrest of the former president, and those that led to the fall of the current regime, which meant that the twins’ birthday no longer fell on the same day as the elections.

A little more…

With K-Family Affairs, Arum Nam manages to deal with complex social issues such as politics, tragedy and women’s rights in a light-hearted tone, using anecdotes from her family. As a result, viewers can become attached to these characters, which is rare in a documentary. 

One question lingers throughout the film. The young woman wonders how far Korean society has come, and how solid these changes are. After all, in recent years, we’ve seen a resurgence of conservative extremism all over the Occident. It would seem that Asia’s democracies are not immune. 

This documentary is a must-see for anyone interested in equality and progressive progress worldwide. And for those interested in South Korea, of course!

A must-see.

K-Family Affairs is presented at RIDM on November 16 and 26, 2023.