SEOUL, May 04 (AJP) - South Korean film "My Name," directed by Chung Ji-young and centering on the 1948 Jeju 4.3 massacre, won the Audience Award at the Udine Far East Film Festival in Italy on Monday, the film's distributor Let's Films said. The victory at Europe's largest festival dedicated to Asian cinema suggests that South Korean historical narratives are gaining universal resonance through popular vote.
The Audience Award is determined by direct ballots from attendees at the Nuovo Giovanni Theater. This marks a significant moment for a film dealing with specific domestic trauma to receive direct validation from an international audience.
Production company Let's Films said the movie tells the story of 18-year-old Shin Woo-bin and his mother, Yeom Hye-ran, as they navigate the legacy of the incident. Since its April 15 release, the film has attracted 191,000 viewers in South Korea while maintaining grassroots momentum through organized relay screenings.
The Jeju 4.3 Incident refers to a series of uprisings and subsequent brutal suppressions on Jeju Island, currently one of South Korea's favorite getaway destinations, between 1948 and 1954. According to the Jeju 4.3 Peace Foundation, the military and police campaign resulted in the death of an estimated 30,000 people, representing roughly 10 percent of the island's population at the time.
Historical records from the National Institute of Korean History show that the Northwest Youth League, a right-wing paramilitary group, carried out many of the most severe atrocities against civilians. The group was primarily composed of Christian refugees who had fled the northern region of the peninsula to escape communist persecution.
Driven by extreme anti-communist sentiment and a sense of displacement, members of the Northwest Youth League engaged in widespread extrajudicial killings, rape, and torture. Their presence on the island was often characterized by a lack of oversight, leading to indiscriminate violence against those suspected of leftist sympathies.
Let's Films stated that the international recognition in Udine highlights the potential for South Korean cinema to facilitate global understanding of human rights issues. The film continues to play in South Korean theaters as civic groups host additional screenings to maintain public awareness.
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