The Korean Film Council has chosen “Escape From Mogadishu”, the most-viewed film this year, as the entry for the Best International Feature at the 2022 Oscars. Los Angeles Times Asia Journal had an interview with Director Seung-wan Ryoo and Executive Producer Hye-Jung Kang who are both coworkers and life partners for each other. In this interview, which you can watch a lightly edited video clip on the Asia Journal Youtube Channel, a careful and specific description of the film and philosophies behind it will be given.
Ryoo Seung-wan is one of South Korea’s most successful commercial film directors, sticking in film-making for more than 20 years. His action films are renowned for fast-paced plots with buoyant energy and well-choreographed action scenes, bringing attention to Korean history and pertinent social issues such as corruption and social inequality. One of his films, Veteran, in 2015 attracted sold more than 13 million moviegoers as the fourth all-time biggest-hit film in Korean cinema record. Ryoo was back in the director’s chair for his 11th feature film, “Escape from Mogadishu”. Producer Kang was always on his side as an executive producer and a CEO of ‘Filmmaker R & K’ which was established in 2005.
On the movie, “Escape from Mogadishu”
“It is like having an accidental crush on predestined love when I run into a good material for film-making,” said the Director Ryoo. “Escape from Mogadishu”, which came to his hand accidentally, is a truvie of stranded South and North Korean diplomats, set against the backdrop of the 1991 Somali Civil War — an event that led to the ousting of President Mohamed Siad Barre by local insurgents. Their inevitable efforts are put on hold when the civil war erupts, and the rivals must cooperate to escape out of the war-torn city, Mogadishu. The thriller film blends action with disaster, humor and heart-moving, which please its audience.
The backdrop about the collapse of Somalia can make you come up with other films such as Ridley Scott’s “Black Hawk Down” or Paul Greengrass’ “Captain Phillips”. But this one is a little bit different from them. The movie doesn’t cast light on the civil war itself but unfolds from the point of view of foreigners embroiled in the unexpected brutality and violence that they don’t fully understand. The Director Ryoo said that he felt confident that it would be a story that only Koreans can depict.
It’s a naturally cinematic true story with suspense and thrill, and on the flip side, it’s a poignant and painful story that tugs at the heartstrings. South Korea, an emerging global powerhouse, was a small and weak state before the millennium. Two Koreas were suffering from the aftermath of the Korean-war and ideological conflict of capitalism versus communism. The governments taught their citizens to have animosity for the opposite citizens and diplomats from the two countries were competing with each other to get a better position for entry into the United Nations. At this point, the movie gives us room to think. The Director Ryoo points out an irony that these rivals in the movie were only counterparts they could communicate without translation in the ravage of the war.
In order to re-enact the Somali Civil War more effectively, Director Ryoo and Producer Kang decided to film everything on location and not have a single shot filmed in Korea. The only problem was that South Koreans are banned from traveling to Somalia. The staff opted for Essaouira, a Moroccan port city as a place that could best represent the atmosphere of Mogadishu. It was such a daunting task for Producer Kang’s team to turn the entire city into Mogadishu in order to replicate Somalia’s atmosphere which even none of them could have experienced. Six months before the shoot started, the crew worked hard to accurately design the environments used in the scenario. “We could fortunately find skilled film staff there including Mohamed Benhmamane,” said the Producer Kang. The producer team could cowork with him, a Moroccan location manager who participated in ‘Gladiator’, ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’ and ‘Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation’. However, there was another adversity to cast actors who look like Somali, because, in fact, Moroccans of Arab and Berber (Amazigh) origin and Somalis of Cushitic ancestry totally look different. Ryoo and Kang’s team casted over 300 extras and 20 out of them were trained by the action director in the team, who played key roles in the movie.
When asked “what is required to adapt historical fact into film?”, Ryoo answered that recognizing limits in running time to express the whole story and shaving off things which can go off at a tangent. “Focusing on everything is impossible and it means everything in the movie can be out of focus,” said the Director. According to his research, the real incident is absolutely dramatic. Preferably, he had to find a middle ground and come up with the thrilling car-chase scene to convince his audience the mind-boggling fact that only one out of 20 people were killed in a hail of bullets.
Amid the pandemic hit, theaters in this summer had to close at 10 p.m. which means that there’s no movie scheduled after 8 p.m. under the highest level of governmental regulation. What is worse is that they had to compete with the live broadcast of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Kang said that as the movie is quite large-scale, they worried about not reaching the breaking-even point. She said that her team didn’t expect to get such a big audience amid the pandemic. Ryoo expressed his frustrated feelings at that time by saying that he felt like he was stepping into the ring for a boxing game but had to use only his left hand.
However, K.O. was not hit because the team went to the end of the round. “My coworkers for distribution in Lotte Entertainment encouraged us to release the movie, which was so helpful,” said Kang. The film drew audiences of more than 3.6 million people and triumphed at the 41st Korean Film Critics Association Awards, picking up four prizes, while Ryoo was awarded Best Director. It also swept the Buil Film Awards, one of the top Korean film industry prize events, taking six prizes.
Against all the odds, Kang explained that it was an opportunity for the team to gain strong confidence that there is an inevitable demand for a movie that people crave to watch in the theater. And it’s distribution rights were sold to over 80 countries. The action blockbuster was also invited to this year’s New York Asian Film Festival and Korean Film Festival in Paris and London as the opening film. As the movie is included in the entry for the Best International Feature category of the Academy Awards 2022. The shortlist at the 2022 Oscars will be unveiled on December 21, with the final nominees following on February 8 before the Academy Awards ceremony on March 27. “We are pouring every effort to advertise and introduce our film to the global moviegoers.”, Kang explained her ambition.
On the global stance of Korean films
With the Korean contents booming overseas, Korea’s national prestige soared, too. Ryoo welcomed the popularity especially from North America and Europe, saying that now they are starting to watch films with subtitles while listening to the foreign language sounds. As he thinks the movie is both ‘watched’ and ‘listened to’ by the audience, their effort to understand the shade of meanings is quite meaningful even if they don’t understand the exact language. Kang also welcomed this tremendous popularity, saying that now it’s the time to expand its audience target and to respond to the change of audience. She looked excited to make films to meet a global audience.
When asked ‘what makes Korean films gain attention from the globe and what is the competitiveness?’, Ryoo explained, “First of all, Korean moviegoers are pretty picky, which emerilizes the films and the industry.” The second thing he said was the dynamics of Korean history and society. Going through from colonization, war, military dictatorship to democratization in the last 50 years, Koreans acquired viability and unique originality. “I think Korea is the most unique country rather than the most powerful county,” said Ryoo with pride. These values did fit in with the contents Koreans created.
Although the global OTT industry is sweeping through the film industry, films for the theaters are the ones Ryoo and Kang want to create. In order to watch a movie in the theater, moviegoers have to pay their money and time. “The choice they make to devote their whole time around 2 hours, I think, is more valuable than the choice made at home,” explained Kang. Yet she is open to any further opportunities, as her company is also preparing various projects to cooperate with global partners in a diverse format, although they are yet to be said to the public. “I hope that we can choose the platform which is best appropriate to launch the content or story we make, soon,” said Kang with a twinkle in her eyes.
Ryoo also expressed his desire and ambition for his further artworks, welcoming the new trend in the content industry. He agreed that the world has become more comfortable for creating diverse contents with better quality but he isn’t disposed to jumping on the bandwagon. He quoted the saying by veteran director Kwon-taek Im; ‘The most Korean thing is the most global thing.’ “We should start with developing the infinite inner potential in Korean society to be competitive on the global stage.”
Kang closed her words by saying, “Here’s the next Korean content you should pay attention to. Enjoy our movie and please don’t forget that there is always dynamic content being created in Korea.” Ryoo greeted his audience, too, saying that “Enjoy the suspense and actions in our movie. Stay tuned to our following movies, too.”
Kayla Hong
Asia Journal
