Welcome to Dongmakgol

In Bevan's article the issue of identity is once again brought up in the context of the Korean War and the divide of a country, "since then, the citizens of the South have been locked in a search to define themselves, to create a people who are more than a group of inhabitants tied together by externally defined boundaries." (p.46). The setting of Welcome to Dongmakgol reminded me of this quote, and by setting I don't mean the physical environment but the implied neutral placement of the village breached by each of the different warring parties. The 'externally defined boundaries' are not present in the village in a physical sense because its inhabitants are removed from the war, but the boundaries are shown rather in the attitudes of the North Korean soldiers versus the South Korean soldiers. The boundaries are molded together when the North and South Korean soldiers and Smith work together in killing the wild boar that roams around the village, proving that the country could reunite through diplomacy and common goals. At the same time however, there's a notable difference in the timing of the soldiers coming to dig up the boar to eat it, I noticed the order in which they came but didn't really take it into account until I was reading a blog post (not from this class) about the film which noted that the violent act of digging up and eating the boar was first approached by the North Koreans, then the South Koreans, and finally Smith, in a representation of the North invading, the South defending, and then the US/UN intervening. I thought that this was pretty interesting, maybe far-fetched but still interesting.

As with the other war films we have watched, Welcome to Dongmakgol included humor in its representation of war time events and once again I was confused as to whether or not I should laugh. The first standoff between the North and South Korean soldiers in which they hold a group of villagers hostage should not be funny, but placed with the confusion of the villagers and their lack of fear at the weapons/threats, the scene suddenly became funny. The humor is then only emphasized by the grenade accident and the scene of raining popcorn, adding to the odd, fantastical aspect of the film. The contrast of the soldiers' aggression towards each other with the comedic anxiety-free villagers did two things at once; first, it lessened the significance of the aggression, trivializing the standoff and what it stood for (the war) in showing that it wasn't the primary focus of everyone's lives, but secondly, it made the villagers out to be somewhat ignorant, how could they have been so unaware of such brutal events in their own country?  I wasn't sure which side to go with, because once I found myself laughing, I also found myself uncomfortable with the show of ignorance.