A documentary filmmaker invited by North Korea to make a propagandistic film turns the tables on his instrusive minders by recording everything — including the Orwellian lives of his fearful film subjects. [ Under the Sun credits: Dir: Vitaliy Manskiy/ 106 min/ Documentary, Foreign/ Anti-Socialism/ 2015/ aka V luchakh solntsa / Latvia ]
External Reviews
“Accompanied constantly by minders, Mansky shot the (scripted) footage he was there to shoot, but also left his cameras running between takes to reveal the fanatical levels of control being exercised over everything we see. Watching the finished film is a uniquely disturbing experience. It’s like someone’s opened a window onto an Orwellian universe where lies are truth, freedom is slavery, and dictatorship is the will of the people.”
–Now Toronto
“The experienced filmmaker has turned the imposed limitations into a huge advantage and simply let the fourth wall fall, exposing the sheer brutality of the North Korean state machine and the misery of living in this society. Without revealing a single detail of the functioning of the state apparatus, Mansky has conveyed its very essence.”
–Cineuropa
“Under the Sun, a feature-length documentary shot in North Korea, is a behind-the-scenes look at a poor country that casts itself as an abundant paradise, and a filmmaking coup of sorts…Director Vitaly Mansky and his crew were allowed to film only approved scenes in specific locations, and the North Koreans would delete any footage they deemed unacceptable. But Mansky had a plan to get around the censors and capture unscripted footage of life in the reclusive state.”
–Los Angeles Times
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