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The Fired Workers

Director: Lee Ji-young
Production Company, Source:
LABOUR NEWS PRODUCTION
102, Jihoun Villa, 482-2 Sangdo 1dong,
Dongjak-gu, Seoul
KOREA
Phone: 82-2-817-9798 / Fax: 82-2-826-0151
e-mail: lnp89@chollian.net
KOREA / 1997 / Korean / Video / 90 min

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Lee Ji-young

Born in 1966. Studied psychology at Koryo University. Joined the Labor News Production Collective in 1992. Made her directorial debut with KTUC (1992) the international news video for the Korea Trade Union Congress. Her works include the Labor News Video Magazine No. 16 (1994), Democratic Labor Union Building News No. 1 and 2 (1995), The Democratic Labor Union from 1987-1995 (1995), Laws for Laborers (1995), Until the Day of Liberation of Labor(1995).

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When the nationwide general strike in Korea hit world news this year, video activists at Labor News Production were hard at work recording events around the country. The Fired Workers, a new documentary from this group, projects the voices of workers fired for their activities in the labor union or political movements since the 1980s. Opening with the shocking 1991 suicide of a fired activist, interviews and footage of demonstrations, hunger strikes, and other acts of protest show how the struggle against government control and corporate abuse took place.

Director's Statement

It took a long time but it was one of the most important times of my life. There is probably no other type of work that could have made me grow as much as the emotional spectrum of anger, disappointment, comrade love that I experienced working on this film. The workers of the Committee for the National Struggle of Fired Workers were not merely subjects captured by my camera. They were my comrades. As I was no machine, the camera was the eye of my consciousness. I grew as a real part of the family of the workers' movement, crying, laughing and shouting with them. Even now when I come across difficult times, I think of them and gain strength from them. I would like to express my love for my comrades of the Committee for the National Struggle of Fired Workers.



 



Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival Organizing Committee