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Analysis

Johannes Schoenherr

A native of Leipzig, East Germany, Schoenherr started out as gravedigger before finding his way to the other side of the Berlin Wall in 1983. Having arrived in the West, he joined the anarchist Kino im KOMM cinema collective in Nuremberg, and it wasn't long before he got involved in setting up American underground shows. He subsequently arranged European tours for some of the transgressive masters and ended up living on the Lower East Side himself soon after that, enrolled at New York University. He received an MA in Cinema Studies in 1994.

From there, Schoenherr expanded his interests to Asia and toured American underground shorts through Japan in 1997, then took Japanese punk & cult movies on a tour of Europe in 1998. He even went as far as going to North Korea to explore their films in 1999, before screening bizarre North Korean propaganda epics at festivals and theaters in Europe in 2000.

He wrote about his strange movie exhibition travels in the book Trashfilm Roadshows (Headpress, 2002), and published a history of North Korean Cinema in Film Out of Bounds (Matthew Edwards (ed.), McFarland, 2007).

He is currently living in Japan as freelance writer on travel, film and food.

Shooting Nonsense in a Strange, Strange Land

J.S.: Your assistant director was Pak Jong-ju? F.B.: Don’t ask me about Korean names. Back than I was able to say his name correctly... Pak something? Pok? Pok? ... Pak! That’s right!J.S.: Pak Jong-ju. I got his name from the North Koreans. He was your assistant.. [2010-05-30 08:33]

(Not) Meeting the Kims

Time to change the tape and order another cappuccino. Rather jokingly, I asked Baldi: “Did you ever meet Kim Jong Il? You know, he’s a big movie fan.” He made a serious face, and I was quick to turn the tape recorder back on.F.B.: One day, the director of the mov.. [2010-05-26 10:13]

It's the Year of the Lips!

J.S.: In the credits in the beginning, it says “Amerinda Est. Productions”. Who was that? An Italian company? Was the film a co-production?F.B.: It was an Italian company. The film was a co-production between that company and North Korea. Amerinda was a part of so.. [2010-05-17 10:00]

Meeting Mr. Baldi

I had seen Ten Zan for the first time at the screening facilities of the Korea Film Export & Import Corporation in Pyongyang in 1999 when I was preparing a North Korean film series to be shown at various European film festivals. I found it strange enough to i.. [2010-05-12 11:11]

Delving into the Background

Ferdinando Baldi, DirectorBaldi was an old work-horse of the Italian exploitation scene. Born in 1927, he had made a lot of peblum films in the early 1960s, films that told stories about life in the Roman Empire, employing for example Orson Welles as King Saul.. [2010-05-08 11:32]

A Plot as Weird as the Location

The bad guys have taken the girl away. An older white guy, Professor Larson (Charles Borromel), hires Ricky (Mark Gregory) and his partner Lou (Frank Zagarino) to eliminate those evil mercenaries that kidnap young women “for the research and development of new stim.. [2010-05-05 15:12]

Ferdinando Baldi's Ultimate Mission

North Korea is not exactly high on the list of international movie shooting locations. The country engaged in a few collaborations with Japan and the then-Soviet Union, but with Western European movie producers? In fact it did, though only once, back in 1988. Let’s.. [2010-05-01 19:48]

Films for the Great Leader?

“I have heard that Kim Jong-il loves movies and watches a lot of them...” I started my question only to be interrupted by U: “I don’t know about that. Our Great Leader works hard for our country, that I know. He doesn’t have time to watch films.”If the films U.. [2010-04-24 08:49]

Who Are U? What Do U Do?

“Why? No.” I said, surprised. “We got the cigarettes for you. 1000 packs. It’s cheap. You only pay 2.50 Deutschmark for one pack, half the price in the store!” “What??” I asked. “1000 packs??? I thought you get me like 20 or so. What am I doing with 1000 pac.. [2010-04-19 09:32]

Kim Turns to Japanese Gangster Flicks

Shortly after, Berlin Film Festival 2000 opened and I was back in town. As always, my first visit was to the film market to meet my friends at the ‘New Cinema from Japan’ booth. This time I had a special question to ask them: “Do you know anything about the movie.. [2010-04-13 15:07]

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