Welcome to Dongmakgol: a satire.

The film Welcome to Dongmakgol was particularly comedic, the entire premise of soldiers from North and South Korea, as well as an American soldier finding themselves planted together in a extremely remote, almost non-existent village is quite interesting. The small village of Dongmakgol is a utopian vision of an unmodernized Korean society. In Dongmakgol the grass is greener, colours are brighter and all is peaceful. While the rest of the country is in a war, the largest problem in the village of Dongmakgol is a wild boar pillaging their potatoes. Of course in the society of Dongmakgol the matter of the boars is very serious. It is safe to say that life in Dongmakgol is fairly simplistic.

A scene that I found particularly amusing was the Mexican standoff between the South Korean and North Korean parties. The situation to them was perilous, and yet the tense mood was continuously interrupted by the amusing dialogues between the villagers. The villagers who are oblivious to the danger of the situation provide a commentary to the standoff which, we with knowledge of modern technology, would find ludicrous. The entrance of the villager who reports the issue of the boars provides yet another layer to the entertaining situation. When the issues of the two parties (the villagers and the soldiers) are paralleled the gravity of the war becomes much less. During the whole Mexican standoff the unintentional defiance of the villager to soldiers undermines not only the soldiers but also the entire war itself. 

The scenes where we see a person who is aware of the war trying to explain the situation to the villagers; they portray the war as being extremely fickle and incomprehensible. The solders themselves who are trying to explain the war do not fully understand the concept either. The entire film, I found as extremely satirical. Why fight when you can live in Dongmakgol… if only it were real…