“Hostile Landscapes” is a two-channel film revolving around the remarkable true story of Ju Hyeongeon (朱贤健/주현건/Zhu Xianjian), a North Korean defector who was imprisoned in Jilin Prison, Northeast China, since 2013, for illegal border-crossing, theft, and robbery. In October 2021, Ju escaped the prison with bare hands and managed to elude local police and authorities for 40 days before he was ultimately captured near the Fengman Dam, a historically significant location with deep Japanese colonial ties.
The film meticulously tracks Ju’s confirmed and potential hideouts, capturing the multilayered local landscapes through a series of cinematic gazes, reconstructing his fugitive odyssey while weaving in other border-crossing East Asian images and (hi)stories. Framed within the broader context of modern and contemporary East Asian history, the work reflects on Chinese/Asian identities/bodies and their entanglements with notions of sovereignty, governance, territory, infrastructure, nationalism, and colonialism.
The film is by default captioned in Chinese and English, with additional Korean and Japanese captions available.
Awards and Selections
2026 (Upcoming) 12th Reel China Biennial, New York University, New York, NY
2026 (Upcoming) Leiden Essay Film Festival, Leiden, NL
2026 Carrier Bags From the Peripherals, Power Station of Art, Shanghai, CN (Extended Installation Version)
2025 Beijing International Short Film Festival, Beijing, CN
2025 39th Image Forum Festival, Tokyo, JP (Grand Prize and Audience Prize)
2025 19th Busan International Video Art Festival, Busan, KR (Jury Prize)
Install shots
Photo credit Jung Hyeonjun
Related Press
“The best video essays of 2025.” Sight and Sound (British Film Institute). Dec 18, 2025.