History of Seoul Human Rights Film Festival
2007-03-22

2006 the 10th Shuriff: Human Rights of Asian People

'The 10 years of Shuriff, Resisting screen never be off!'

With the desire, 'to be survived', of one visitor on the 1st festival, Shuriff screened films and resistance, passing numerous crisises. From the 1st to 9th festival, totally 308 films were shown in 21,251 minutes.

The 10th festival run from May 6th to 13th in Seoul and on 14th in Daechuri, Pyung-taek. Theme of this festival was 'Human Rights of Asian People'. Asia is regarded as countries of tourism and investment, development and poverty. Therefore we planned to see the situation of Asian people. The festival showed war and conflict, poverty and discrimination in Asian countries such as China, Burma, and Bangladesh.

We also prepare to re-screen the popular films ever screened in last 10 Shuriffs. And the closing ceremony of this festival took place at Hwang-sae-ul, Pyung-taek, where suffering from U.S. Army.

2005 the 9th Shuriff: Human Rights of Children and Juveniles

The 9th festival run from May 20th to 26, and the theme was 'Human Rights of Children and Juveniles'. This festival has shown nearly 30 films about anti-globalization, anti-consuming society, nuclear and peace, and human rights of Africa. Especially many children has participated in this festival, and the debate forum about juvenile rights was one of the crowded events of festival.

For the blind handicapped, 3 films were dubbed with commentary, and we published manual in raised type. And we also talk with fingers for hearing-impaired audience.

2004 the 8th Shuriff: Prison and Human Rights

The 8th Shuriff have run from May 21h to 26h, and nearly 5,000 people came to our festival. Theme of this festival was 'Prison and Human Rights'. The reality of prison can tell the 'now' of human rights in that society. Through the improper appreciations like 'what human rights to criminals', infringement on human rights is not a serious problem on the Korean now. Committing crime cannot be the condition of infringement on human rights. Men and women have their rights to be guaranteed, and the prisoned cannot be the exception. So we screened the films that show the reality of prison in various views.

2003 the 7th Shuriff: Migrant workers and Human Rights

The 7th Shuriff have run from May 23th to 28th, and about 5,000 people visited. The year 2003 is meaningful for that Korea was to join the international treaty, International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families. Not only for the treaty, the issue of migrant worker has been one of the serious social problem in Korea. Consequently this festival revealed international as well as domestic migrant workers problems and tried to tell their reality in terms of human rights.

2002 the 6th Shuriff: War and Human Rights

From May 30th to June 5th. In spite of wild mood of World Cup, many visited our festival. For seven days in two theaters, nearly 5,600 people watched and 35 films including 10 domestic ones were screened.

Theme of festival was 'War and Human Rights'. Rooting last century, the wars in mask of humanitarianism have taken place in many areas in this world. Therefore, we planned the festival to watch carefully world people suffering from war. Totally 8 films are intended to tell the human rights in battlefield.

After each domestic films were screened, the director have time to talk with audience.

2001 the 5.5th Shuriff: Remembering Masterpieces

This is the 5.5th. We recollected last 5 years and planed the 6th festival. In other words, it is 'checking point' of Shuriff. Totally 19 films were selected from 162 films screened in Shuriffs from 1996 until 2000. The criteria of selecting films was audience's responses and film's value in terms of human right. The biggest change of the festival is the first theater-screened festival and has moved from fall to spring. Generally, there are so many rights problems in autumn, that is the first reason, and several main film festivals opened their theaters in autumn, so we referred to shift the time of festival. We worried that rescreening could be criticized for insincerity, but audience thought it was a great opportunity to watch the last human rights masterpieces.

2000 the 5th Shuriff

Totally 20 films were screened. The most attracted film was 'Ernesto Guevara: Bolivian Diary>, the opening film of this festival. We also especially screened movies for gay and lesbian. In this festival, we planned events such as 'Crime report on News and Human Right', 'Peace Slanderer', and 'Talk about Homosexuality' which was the most crowded one. All directors of domestic film screened in this festival were invited and two foreign directors, Cavin MacKinnon and Sayed Kedo, came to festival at their own expenses. About 12,000 people visited and 50 volunteers worked together.

1999 Seoul Human Rights Film Festival Report

The fourth annual human rights film festival was held at the [Academy & Culture Hall] at Dongguk University. From November 26th to December 2nd, 14 domestic films and 29 international films were shown in 53 screenings. Among these films, the opening film [All Power to the People], and [Escobar's Own Goal], [Socoro Nobre-Life is Somewhere Else], [Sorrow and Pity], [Cell Animation], [Red Hunt2], [Mindullae], [The sad story Grandmother], [Tropical Nights] received the most attention from the festival participants. [All Power to the People] is an excellent film that calmly ruminates the facts of the "Black Panther" party and exposes the vicious racial discrimination of the U.S.

The biggest trend of this year's film festival was the "rapid growth of Korean films" and the audience also showed an increased interest in Korean films. The second installment of documentaries from Hanee Production exposing the truth of "April 3rd Cheju Uprising,"[Red Hunt2] attracted a lot of attention even before the opening of the festival. Another film that deals with the Cheju Uprising is [The sad story of Grandmother] which documents the tragic life of Jin Ah-young Halmuhni (Grandmother), a victim of the government crackdown of Cheju Uprising. The makers of this film, '4.3. Documentary Production' is currently making a series of films like [The sad story of Grandmother] that documents the lives of Cheju Uprising victims.

This year, the Human Rights Film Festival presented its first "Human Rights Film Award" to [Tropical Nights], which documented the '98 mass personnel cut of Hyundai Motors. This film was made by Lee Gun Ho, who himself lost his job due to "restructuring" of Pusan Korean Broadcasting Service. This one-man production was shot during the two months that Lee lived with the workers of Hyundai who staged a campaign opposing the personnel cut of Hyundai Motors.

There were several activities accompanying the film screenings at this year's film festival. First, the campaign for the release of Mumia Abu Jamal was held throughout the festival and festival participants were asked to write protest postcards to the American Embassy.

The First Seoul Human Rights Film Festival was held at Ehwa Women University in Seoul and at 14 other cities in Korea from November of 1996 for a duration of two months. The first film festival was sponsored by 100 organizations and 600 sponsors who had faith in human rights, democracy, and films. 32 films were shown to the public with free admission. About 30,000 audiences (15,000 audiences in Seoul) attended the festival. The First Seoul Human Rights Film Festival with the belief of freedom of expression was the first organized effort to refuse all unconstitutional government censorship. The festival had brought massive media and public attention and despite pressure from the government, the event was carried out without much difficulty and in festival atmosphere.