A Kim Jong-Il Production: The Extraordinary True Story of a Kidnapped Filmmaker, His Star Actress, and a Young Dictator's Rise to Power

An Amazon Best Book of the Month for February 2015: There was a time when the duo of Shin Sang-Ok and Choi Eun-Hee seemed unassailable. Shin was the extraordinarily successful South Korean movie director and producer; his beautiful wife Choi was his top star and muse, a woman who had elevated herself from a difficult early life to become the envy of men and women alike. From the late 50s until the early 70s, the duo ruled—but divorce, scandal, and diminishing star power brought them back to earth. Little did they know, it was about to get much, much worse. Paul Fischer’s A Kim Jong-Il Production is the bizarre and fascinating true story of Shin and Choi’s kidnapping by Kim Jong-Il, future Supreme Leader of North Korea (at the time he was son to the then-Supreme Leader). Shin and Choi, who were kidnapped in 1978, went on to make a number of films in North Korea (as the “guest” of Kim Jong-Il) before escaping to the U.S. in 1986. There’s a Through the Looking Glass feel to this book, despite it being extremely well-researched and believable, that makes it highly entertaining reading. I had a difficult time putting this book down until I was finished. – Chris Schluep