Synopsis

At Yangjiri, a small town in Cheorwon-gun, Gangwon-do, there lives farmers who are busy all the year preparing for their winter guests to Cheorwon Plains every year. During the spring and summer, they cultivate the land and prepare habitats for their guests, and in the fall, they prepare food from their harvest. In the winter, they fill their farm with water for their guests. The guests they are longing for, are the cranes. The National Monument coming from thousands of kilometers away. The farmers of Cheorwon-gun, they have been wintering with cranes for over 30 years. There is a special story about cranes. The DMZ, the product of war, and the land of Cheorwon in the Civilian Control Zone. However, people and nature live together in harmony and peace. How are the farmers and cranes taking care of their living foundation?

Director's Comment

The space created by the war, the DMZ and the Civilian Control Line, were spaces full of military confrontation and tension. But at the same time, paradoxically, it has become a land of hope and peace for the residents and cranes of the region. Every year, endangered cranes of natural monuments spend winter here, and farmers in Cheorwon have chosen to live a life of coexistence with them. Korea is turning into an advanced country, but the resulting development and desire are unlikely to leave this place as it is anymore. The paradox and irony of the space brought by the war are endless. Nevertheless, farmers and cranes here will continue the survival of the coexistence they have created, as they have been for more than 40 years. Based on the paradoxical and ironic images of the space created by the war, cranes, and people who have lived here, we would like to create an animated documentary that shows their coexistence in front of war, peace, development, and desire.

Staff

Program Note

The village located in Cheorwon-gun across the DMZ is visited by a crane each winter. Crane Village is a designated sanctuary for migratory birds. This animation follows the conflict between the people trying to protect the village and those opposed to them, quietly observing the relationship between human beings and nature. The warm artwork and animation have a poetic sensibility that is combined with the realism of a documentary to examine in a nuanced way how nature and humanity depend on each other to exist and coexist.

KIM Changsoo