People Are the Sky

A film by Dai Sil Kim-Gibson

US | 2015 | 94 minutes | Color | Order No. 161188

SYNOPSIS

Director Dai Sil Kim-Gibson (MOTHERLAND CUBA KOREA USA) is the first Korean American filmmaker to be given official permission by the North Korean government to film inside its borders. In PEOPLE ARE THE SKY, Kim-Gibson’s eighth and most personal film, the filmmaker makes a pilgrimage to her place of birth in North Korea for the first time in nearly 70 years, to explore if it is still home.

Kim-Gibson seamlessly weaves her own personal story as a native born North Korean, with the fractious history of the North/South division and pinpoints the roots of North Korean’s hatred of the United States, giving Americans a much better understanding of the conflict. A mix of interviews epic images and graceful musings, PEOPLE ARE THE SKY offers some of the best political and social history of the relations between North and South Korea, and also a contemplative exploration of the meaning of home. The result is unprecedented, at times startling, for hers is an up close look of the hurts and desires, beauty and contradiction, pride and aspirations of the long held demonized nation.

PRESS

“[Kim-Gibson] is determined to bring the voices of the voiceless to the screen and people who are often overlooked. And so she has attempted through her films to humanize the world.”

Mary Elizabeth Moore, Dean Boston University School of Theology

SCREENING HIGHLIGHTS AND AWARDS

  • Hawaii International Film Festival
  • Korean American Film Festival, New York
  • Louisville International Film Festival
  • Los Angeles Asian American Film Festival

ABOUT FILMMAKER(S)

Dai Sil Kim-Gibson

Dai Sil Kim-Gibson is an independent filmmaker/writer, known for championing the compelling but neglected issues of human rights. All of her films garnered many awards, including the Kodak Filmmaker Award, and were screened at numerous festivals worldwide, in addition to national broadcast on PBS and on the Sundance Channel in the United States. She has received grants from the Rockefeller and MacArthur Foundations. Formerly professor of religion at Mount Holyoke College with a Ph.D in religion from Boston University, and an author of many articles, "Silence Broken: Korean Comfort Women" is her first book (The Philadelphia Inquirer, "unforgettable") and her second book is "Looking for Don: A Meditation." She has also complied and edited a memoir by her late husband, Donald D. Gibson, "Iowa Sky." Her own memoir, "Korean Sky" is now available at Amazon.com. (3/16)

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