Crossing [Keurosing - 2008]

South Korea's 2009 Academy Awards official submission to Foreign-Language Film category.

The movie is based on a real story about the life of a North Korean defector and his family. Actor Cha In-pyo starred as a North Korean coal miner who crossed illegally into China to get medicine for his wife. His wife passed away soon after he crossed the border, and he was separated from his 11-year-old son (played by Shin Myung-chul) who was trying to trace him from North Korea. The story shares the hardship of North Korean refugees in the late 1990s, with famine striking the country and killed an estimated 1 million people. The North Koreans couldn’t cross into South Korea directly because of landmines and heavy military presence at the border… these defectors had to cross into China and made a detour to South Korea instead. The Chinese government, an ally of the North Korean regime, does not recognize the defectors as refugees and would send them back to North Korea to face stiff action.