IFA Films NK Escape Script

In a small flat, inside North Korea, a mother and daughter pose for pictures.

And a father and son.

This, their secret family album; shot on a camera phone, an illegal device in North Korea; owning one is a crime that could land them labour camp.

Overwhelmed by hopelessness, struggling to survive, the Park family has decided to try to escape.

To do so will cost them their every last penny. They all know it could also cost them their lives.

Travelling; tracking snowy landscape

The camera-phone pictures were taken in January. Months would pass before the escape plan could be put into action.

It's all being coordinated from neighbouring China.

Jung and Che in front of van

This is "Uncle Jung," Mrs Park's brother. He's masterminding their escape; it's his job to get them safely into China.

A former North Korean state security agent, he defected six years ago. We can't show his face; "Uncle Jung" is not his real name.

The man driving the car is a serving North Korean agent, who's in on the plan.

UPSOT

SUBTITLES:

Jung: "Where is the exact spot they will cross the border? Which part of the border?"

Agent: "They are waiting now in the house, waiting for you to call."

Jung c/u dials number

It was "Uncle Jung" who'd smuggled the camera phone in to his sister. He calls her.

UPSOT TELEPHONE CONVERSATION

He tells her to pay off the traffickers and smugglers with the money he's just sent in. Then they discuss the route. "Go to Musan," Jung says, "When you get there, hide and then call me."

Views across the river into North Korea

The world's most repressive regime rules the other side of the river.

That's Musan, a bleak North Korean mining city.

The "Stalinist paradise" of the Korean Democratic Peoples' Republic is a land of gulags, privation and misery. Not hard to see why people defect.

The Park family will cross the Tumen River which runs along part of the 900-mile border with China.

If they're caught, they face concentration camp and almost certain execution.

Mobile phone GVs, May

There's been silence for months now and growing fears the family's been rumbled.

Then, one day in mid-May, Uncle Jung gets the call. They're in Musan.

On his own mobile phone, he's able to film the first to cross; a friend of the family who says they're on their way.

UPSOT

Jung repeately tells him to hurry.

Travelling shot

Then, with the family on board, they quickly move to a safehouse.

Reunion

Finally, brother and sister collapse into eacheothers' arms; appropriately enough the scene's caught on cameraphone. There's no audio. Body-language speaking volumes though; exhaustion, relief; a moment of respite between the end of one risky journey and the start of another.

Hotel Shenyang

So, here they all are then: the Park family. By North Korean standards, fairly priviledged, middle class.

Mr Park, an ex-policemen; Mrs Park; their 23-year-old daughter, Wun Jong, an her shy schoolboy brother Chol Hak.

UPSOT

Park Myong Kwan

Father

"We wanted to wait for darkness, but we were afraid the guards would find us, so we just jumped into the river. Either way we risked death, so we just had to go for it.".

Now they're out, Jung hands over responsibility to this man; we'll call him "CK."

He's a South Korean Christian, who, through an underground network, smuggles North Koreans into South Korea. Ten thousand of them now live there; in the south there is freedom - and food.

There's a price on CK's head in the North. Some of his associates have also been jailed in China.

CK gleans new information about life inside. From Wun Jong he learns that possession of a South Korean film now gets you five years in jail.

SYNC

CK

"It's a rare case that an entire family defects. Normally you get individual defectors but this is a case of a whole family escaping, and I am quite concerned about their safety. Arrest by Chinese authorities means death to them."

Shenyang bus / train

A people-trafficker's been paid to get them through China.

Over the next week they'll travel by any means possible to reach the Lao border; a trip of around 4,000 miles.

They don't speak Chinese. They don't have any documents.

For the Parks, time to reflect - they'd left home in such a hurry, no time for farewells. China though, like a breath of fresh air.

SYNC

Park Myong Kwan

Father

"Here in China, regardless of whether you are a high-ranking official or not, there is no discrimination. I like that very much, we are all human beings, and should be treated fairly."

But North Koreans aren't welcome in China; thousands get deported every year. In contrast, Thailand - where they're headed - deports North Korean defectors to South Korea.

They make it to a small town on China's border with Laos.

The closer they get to the border the more jittery they become.

SYNC

Park Myong Kwan

Father

"Frankly, we feel like we're lying on a chopping board right now. It's like we are gambling, but the stakes are our lives."

GVs farmhouse; waiting

Their trafficker gives the order to move only at the last minute. For three days, they sit it out in a farmhouse near the border, nerves jangling.

Packing up

Day four, six am and they've just been told to pack up fast.

Walking GVs

The trail they're taking through the mountains to the Lao frontier is mostly used by opium traffickers. They've been lucky; no Chinese border patrols.

Under the fence

Their people traffickers guide the five travellers to the token barbed wire fence - and then they're through.

In the van

They don't hang around; first, five-hours cross-country by motorbike; then 14 hours in a van to Vientiane, the Lao capital.

Chunder

They've been on the road for a fortnight. The strain of their epic journey is beginning to tell.

SYNC

Kwon Sun Yo

Mother

"I had never realised we'd have to travel across several countries' borders. I know we will be reaching the capital city of Laos in a few hours, so now I am more hopeful."

SYNC

Park Myong Kwan

Father

"I think it has been worth the risk. I am not betraying my country, I am just trying to find freedom."

Night shot; family sleeping in van

Flooding and heavy rain has caused delays. Laos is also a Communist country. They've had to skirt regular checkpoints here too.

Vientiane lunch

Finally, in Vientiane, CK joins them again.

They're physically and emotionally wrecked. Each, overcome at some point by conflicting feelings.

Food on table

In North Korea, where ten years ago famine killed two million people, they haven't seen food like this in living memory.

New shots Mrs Park

UPSOT

Mrs Park talks about how harsh it was having food strictly rationed at home; it wasn't enough to survive on, he says.

UPSOT Wun Jong

Wun Jong says she's been left with a bitter taste; "I kept wondering whether I was doing the right thing, leaving the land I was born in," she says.

Playing cards

They're in another safehouse now. Another long wait. Five days this time.

Myong Chol sinks into depression. His wife and son had walked out on him when he been unable to put food on the table during the famine.

CK talks with Lee Myong Chol, who's crying; CK translates

"The life he has had in North Korea, he cannot recollect without tears... looking at the family, mother and father, and children together, that is something very difficult for him to bear, that is the kind of life he missed in his entire life... if he will be here, with his wife and child, how happy would I be... he likes to work very hard in south Korea, and make as much money as possible, he is going to spend his entire fortune to look for his wife and his son."

Telly

The Park family settles down to watch a South Korean movie. For them and for CK, this is a moment to savour.

In eight years, CK has helped more than 100 North Koreans escape. He doesn't enjoy what he does but he's driven by his desire to expose the excesses of the Pyongyang regime. Pressed, CK provides a rare insight into his operations; it's not really an organisation, he says.

SYNC

"CK"

10:17 "It's a kind of network, nobody belongs to me and I don't belong to anybody. But on a specific operation, we agree on the merit of the operation, so we coordinate and work together, and when the operation is over, OK, we are all back to individual again."

Extend samlor night sequence

CK operations are financed by gifts from friends, he says, and anonymous donors.

They're on the move again. The final frontier.

Away from the camera, they quietly cross the Mekong River into Thailand, under cover of darkness.

On the Thai side

CK recaps crossing: "They crossed the river just before dawn this morning...nobody was sure if they were going to make it or not, very luckily they did, and now they are on Thailand, and they are very happy. But unfortunately this is not the end of their journey. Now they have to find their way to Bangkok to surrender themselves, to surrender themselves to the immigration authorities."

SYNC

Park Myong Kwan

Father

"Right now I am feeling better than I have ever felt. I've heard that back in my hometown, there's a big problem because we have left, but I don't care about that, because they can't stop us now."

Boarding train, train GVs

The plan now: get to the South Korean embassy in Bangkok fast; register, then give themselves up to the Thai police.

The arrest

After 11 hours, just short of Bangkok, Thai police spot them.

Arrest means they won't get to the embassy - it's not that big a deal - but coming from a police state, this encounter has scared the whole family.

Group gets walked outside of the train

They'll be taken to an immigration holding centre where they'll wait while their cases are processed. They'll then join the queue of other North Korean defectors waiting to be flown to the South Korean capital.

SYNC

CK

"They have just been taken away to a local police station, and I told them this is Thailand, a great land of liberty, and humanitarianism. And I told them not to panic, and they will be deported to South Korea in about two months' time."

The caged police pickup, a strange welcome to Thailand, the "Land of the Free." Tonight, the Parks and their trusty companion Myong Chol remain in a Bangkok detention centre.

They are survivors. By putting a family's lives on the line, these parents have given their children something they never had - hope and a future.

ends