Film producer, Nicholas Bonner, is British and resides in Beijing, China. He has produced three documentary films on North Korea – Crossing the Line (2006), A State of Mind (2004), and The Game of Their Lives (2002). Since 1993, he has been in the forefront of organizing cultural events between North Korea and the West.
Crossing the Line – In 1962, Joseph Dresnok, a U.S. soldier stationed in South Korea on the 38th Parallel, the Demilitarized Zone that divides the Korean peninsula deserted his unit and defected to North Korea. At the height of the Cold War, it was unthinkable for an American soldier to voluntarily reject Western democracy and cross the most heavily fortified border on earth to join the Communist side. Once in North Korea, Dresnok became a coveted movie star playing the role of an evil American known affectionately as “Comrade Joe.” After 45 years of obscurity, Dresnok provides a first-person account of his life in North Korea along with tales of the other three American soldiers who also did the unthinkable – gave up on the American Dream and voluntarily joined the Communist Revolution in North Korea.
Sponsored by the College of Arts and Letters, Helen Kellogg Institute for International Studies, the Department of Film, Television, and Theatre, the Nanovic Institute for European Studies, International Student Services and Activites, and The Korea Society.