Beyond Utopia

Escaping North Korea is hard: first of all you have to get across the border to China, but China (and many other countries in South East Asia) will send you back if caught). A shadowy network of people smugglers can be paid to help you (perhaps by relatives who have already escaped). This documentary follows two people trying to get their relatives out. We see actual video calls with people in the North, and the film-makers have even joined the escapees once they've left the country, enjoying their first tastes of freedom but not yet on safe soil. It makes for a powerful and at times heart-breaking tale. The world is full of terrible things, but the stories we are told of the self-defeating cruelty of the North Korean regime are particularly hard to stomach, even for the initially disinterested viewer. One day the regime will fall; for now, the only hope that people have is to quite literally place their lives on the line and attempt to make it out.