Some people out there may even remember that one of the killers wore a white t-shirt that had “LOL” written across the chest in thick black letters. For “Assassins,” White’s extensive research included travel to Vietnam, Indonesia and Malaysia. Sign up for our Email Newsletters here. “Assassins” generates sufficient suspense over the outcome of Siti and Doan’s joint trial, but their innocence is unambiguous, particularly after White embeds himself with Siti’s legal team. South Korean and U.S. officials have said the North Korean regime had ordered the assassination of Kim, who had criticized his family’s dynastic rule. Basic. This is hardly a new phenomenon, even if it’s now occurring at an unprecedented pace: The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist, and history’s most dangerous men have always been those who knew that rational people would struggle to imagine their crimes. Additionally, our coverage will provide alternative viewing options whenever they are available. ASSASSINS travels from the sanctums of Pyongyang to the rice fields of Indonesia and Vietnam to the courtrooms of Kuala Lumpur to tell an extraordinary tale of manipulation and subterfuge in the age of social media.A masterful investigation that offers an unprecedented look at the real story of Kim Jong-nam’s murder, ASSASSINS is the wildly … The film focuses on the two women – Indonesian Siti Aisyah and Vietnamese Doan Thi Huong – who were charged with poisoning Kim by smearing his face with the banned chemical weapon VX and had at one point faced a mandatory death penalty in Malaysia. Editor’s note: This review was originally published at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. This Article is related to: Film, Reviews and tagged Assassins, North Korea, Reviews, Sundance. Kim Jong-Nam was the first-born son of Kim Jong-Il, the older brother of current North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, and at one point the presumed heir apparent to … ), and learn why Kim Jong-um wanted him dead. Her social media presence is an un-curated stream of emojis, exclamation points, and excitement about places she might soon travel for work. LOS ANGELES, Jan 29 — Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, a new documentary seeks to shed light on the brazen airport murder and the involvement of the two young women accused of carrying it out. But he said hearing from the women themselves was the most crucial factor in finding the reality behind the headlines. White indicates that Kim Jong-nam found despotism to be distasteful, and preferred the capitalistic vibrancy of American theme parks to the autocratic desolation of Pyongyang, but anyone interested in pulling on that thread is watching the wrong movie. 'The Affair' Review: Carice van Houten Carries a Generic Melodrama About a Remarkable House The assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother Kim Jong Nam at Kuala Lumpur’s airport in February of 2017, I’m embarrassed to say, was a blip on my radar. Siti was freed in March 2019 after a Malaysian court dropped charges against her. He knew that the facts would prove riveting enough on their own (and they do), and he wanted to capture this liquid moment in history before we all wiped our hands of it, or it sublimated into the atmosphere of an age when the breathing air has become toxic enough to disguise the other poisons we pump into it. We get a crash course in the North Korean chain of succession (infographics! Did the sheer audacity of that hit linger in your mind the same way it might have had you seen it in the James Bond movie where it belongs? And people will remember the name Siti Aisyah, and the name Doan Thi Huong, and they will remember how their lives were forever interrupted by something so crazy it could only happen in a movie. There was a vague recollection of two young women who were caught on CCTV smearing the deadly VX nerve agent on his face and running away. 'The Affair' Review: Carice van Houten Carries a Generic Melodrama About a Remarkable House, New Movies: Release Calendar for March 5, Plus Where to Watch the Latest Films, 7 New Netflix Shows in February, and the Best Reasons to Watch. It’s gripping and terrible to watch as North Korean agents seize upon her desperation and string her along via a series of disguised practice missions. Indeed, the story is so outlandish — and the film so dry — that it’s hard not to be impressed by the discipline White showed in refusing to have more fun with it. We gather that the Malaysian judicial system would sooner hang someone than hear them out, but this isn’t a documentary about how power has corrupted those courts. And so it’s easy enough to appreciate why Ryan White decided to make a documentary that explains the death of Kim Jong-nam in the most straightforward terms possible; why “Assassins” eschews subplots, color commentary, or even any kind of residual context as it walks us through what happened. But did any of that information really sink in? (Reuters) – Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, a new documentary seeks to shed light on the brazen airport murder and the involvement of the two young women accused of carrying it out. A masterful investigation that offers an unprecedented look at the real story of Kim Jong-nam’s murder, Assassins is the wildly improbable tale of a calculating dictator, a nefarious plot, a very public murder, and two women fighting for their lives. Her name is Doan Thi Huong, and she grew up on a Vietnamese farm where she was too skittish to even butcher a chicken. The assassination of Kim Jong-nam occurred on 13 February 2017 when he was attacked with VX nerve agent at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, Malaysia. White also tees up a damning portrait of international diplomacy, and how the sins of those at the top of the governmental ladder often trickle down and destroy the most vulnerable citizens of their respective countries, but he always stops himself short of a thesis. Doan and Aisyah were shown the documentary earlier this week, and while the film got their blessing, Doan expressed regret over some scenes, White said. Or until a trustworthy filmmaker has laid out the facts against an ominous score and punctuated them with enough infographics and interview footage to remind you that truth is stranger than fiction (and getting weirder every day). When she smiles — and she’s always smiling — we can see that her teeth are wired with braces. Hey, Oscars! Greenwich Entertainment releases the film in select theaters on Friday, December 11. Nearly 4 years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un's estranged half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, a new documentary seeks to … Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! By Hanna Rantala, Jonathan Oatis 3 Min Read (Reuters) - Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, a new documentary … The Best Zombie Movies Ever Made. The documentary Assassins, opening in theaters today, ... Kim Jong-nam—half-brother of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un—walked into the … Sign up for our Email Newsletters here. Or did it all seem too farfetched to settle into the part of your brain that tries to make sense of world history? “Her first reaction … was, ‘I wish I hadn’t smiled so much,'” he said, referring to scenes showing the return to Vietnam of Doan, who White said became a target for vitriol on social media and has “retreated into her shell a lot more.”. Storyline Unraveling the audacious airport assassination of the exiled and estranged half-brother to North Korean Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un, ASSASSINS is a riveting dissection of infamous dynasty dynamics and the surprising tale of two young women recruited to secure the uncontested leadership of Kim Jong-un. Kim Jong Nam's killing at Malaysia's Kuala Lumpur International Airport in February 2017 was caught on grainy CCTV … Siti makes a comment about how Doan is the only one who could possibly understand her plight, and — like so many of the ledes that Ryan doesn’t follow — it feels like an unopened portal to a whole new universe of intrigue. (https://reut.rs/2KWDB8f). Interviews with leading film and TV creators about their process and craft. So from Siti we go to the remarkable CCTV footage, and see the final moments of Kim Jong-nam’s life in all of their bizarre and pixelated glory. Kim Jong Nam’s killing https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-malaysia-kim-murder/murder-at-the-airport-the-brazen-attack-on-kim-jong-nam-idUSKCN1RD185 at Malaysia’s Kuala Lumpur International Airport in February 2017 was caught on grainy CCTV footage broadcast worldwide, yet many details still remain a mystery. That’s when she met a mysterious man who offered her a lucrative gig making “funny videos” for Japanese television. When four years ago film-maker Ryan White heard about the airport assassination of Kim Jong-nam he knew the story was extraordinary but he … “Assassins” finds its pulse in the fact that it was filmed in media res, before the dust had settled on this strange ordeal, and the perspective of Siti’s counsel proves invaluable during the trial. Jong-nam was the eldest son of North Korea’s previous leader Kim Jong-il, but was forced to leave the country in disgrace after being caught visiting Disneyland in disguise. White, whose previous docs included Hulu’s Ask Dr. Ruth and HBO’s The Case Against 8, turns his lens this time on the brazen murder of Kim Jong-nam, the half-brother of … She turned to a career in entertainment when she couldn’t find a way to put her accounting degree to good use, eventually auditioning (quite poorly) for “Vietnamese Idol” before settling for a job as a waitress. It was released on December 11, 2020 by Greenwich Entertainment Copyright © 2021 Penske Business Media, LLC. Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Director Ryan White revealed an anonymous source supplied his team with hundreds of hours of footage from multiple vantage points of the death of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s half-brother for their documentary movie ASSASSINS. The 2017 killing of Kim Jong-nam, older half-brother of North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un, was a chilling expression of merciless Pyongyang realpolitik. The documentary titled Assassins, which is available to download today, reveals for the first time exactly how cunning their plot was. IN VIRTUAL CINEMAS & ON DEMAND NOW. Pyongyang has denied the allegation. An example: Back in February of 2017, you probably heard something about how Kim Jong-un’s older brother was assassinated in broad daylight at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. "Straight out of a spy movie" is how one news network describes the killing of Kim Jong-nam at the start of Assassins, but the new documentary from Ryan White, which premiered at … By the time “Assassins” is over, however, White has addressed Siti’s isolation in his own way. By Movieguide® Staff. His documentary’s vacuum-like seal has a tendency to separate this entire saga from the outside world (we understand its place in Kim Jong-un’s agenda, but everything beyond that is left to inference), and yet telling Siti’s bizarre story in such clear terms will make it real in the minds of those who didn’t know what to do with the raw information when it first came out. Defense lawyers maintained they were pawns in an assassination orchestrated by North Korean agents. There were rumors that the two women had been under the impression they were participating in a Japanese prank show, but that deranged twist only made the news seem more disposable somehow. White’s relationship with them was also likely instrumental in securing audio recordings of the interviews the women conducted in prison, though the filmmaker naturally elects not to explore the friendship that forms between the suspects behind bars. He’s far more interested in the girl who laughed at death. We live in a golden age of artless documentaries that have no discernible purpose or ambition beyond regurgitating the recent past for people who would rather spend 90 minutes watching something on Netflix than 10 minutes reading the same information on Wikipedia, but the truth is that things have gotten so out of hand that you can’t even believe that certain things have happened until you see them with your own two eyes. The two young women accused of murdering Kim Jong-nam are the subject of this slick documentary Doan Thi Huong and Siti Aisyah being escorted out of a courthouse by armed guards. ‘Assassins’ Review: A Clear Documentary About the Craziest Murder of the 21st Century Ryan White's riveting documentary unpacks the story of … Here’s How to Craft a Successful Virtual Awards Show — TV Podcast, Golden Globes 2021 May Not Predict the Oscars, but They Will Help a Few Key Contenders, How International Voters Are Shaping This Year’s Oscar Season, The Visceral Cinema of ‘Sound of Metal’ Was Rooted in an Immersive Set, Oscar Cinematography Survey: Here Are the Cameras and Lenses Used to Shoot 32 Awards Contenders, The Music Track Shaka King Played at Every ‘Judas and the Black Messiah’ Pitch, 35 Must-See New Movies to See This Fall Season, 40 Indie Horror Movies Now Streaming, from ‘The Witch’ to ‘Midsommar’, Karlovy Vary International Film Festival Delays 2021 Event to August, ‘WandaVision’ Is the Weird Disney+ ‘Hit’ That Could Change Streaming’s Future. Related Did the geopolitical implications of the attack inspire you to follow the story as it fanned out to a matrix of ambassadors and secret agents that spread across the whole of Asia? 7 New Netflix Shows in February, and the Best Reasons to Watch Written by Mae Moreno (Reporting by Hanna Ratala; Writing by Jonathan Oatis; Editing by Rosalba O’Brien), FILE PHOTO: Siti Aisyah, who was previously a suspect in the murder case of North Korean leader's half brother Kim Jong Nam reacts as she talks during news conference at Halim Perdanakusuma airport in Jakarta, U.S. Senate works through the night to advance Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 bill, Pope Francis meets Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric, visits birthplace of Prophet Abraham, Hong Kong electoral reforms prevent ‘dictatorship of the majority’, says pro-Beijing lawmaker, Egypt’s Sisi visits Sudan with dam diplomacy, security on the agenda, Myanmar forces fire tear gas, stun grenades on protest as U.N. envoy calls for action, Roosevelt Island woman uncovers secret apartment behind bathroom mirror in viral TikTok videos, Women wanted: Abbey Road Studios tackle industry imbalance, Guy Fieri talks new season of ‘Tournament of Champions’ and launch of new delivery-only virtual dining concept, Romanian film of sex and aggression in the city wins Berlinale, State Halts Construction of Marsha P. Johnson Park After Family, Trans Activists Push Back, Caribbean Life: Queens Edition: March 5, 2021, Laz Letcher, Thank You For Coming Out (While Staying In), ‘He was the sweetest thing ever’: Family of Hamilton Avenue hit-and-run victim demands justice. As new movies open in theaters during the COVID-19 pandemic, IndieWire will continue to review them whenever possible. Kim Jong-nam was the eldest son of deceased North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and the half-brother of Kim Jong-un , who is currently the leader of North Korea. You might still recall that his name was Kim Jong-nam, or that he was murdered by two young women who snuck up behind him in the middle of the crowded terminal, cupped his eyes as if they were surprising an old friend, and wiped VX nerve agent — the deadliest substance on Earth — directly into his eyes. We encourage readers to follow the safety precautions provided by CDC and health authorities. Labyrinthine planning by a team of North Korean undercover agents went into the attack, carried out by a pair of seemingly unwitting women at Kuala Lumpur airport by smearing Jong-nam (pictured below) with VX nerve agent. By Hanna Rantala and Jonathan Oatis (Reuters) - Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, a new documentary seeks to shed light on the brazen airport murder and the involvement of the two young women accused of carrying it out. Kim Jong-nam had not been in favour with his half-brother Kim … By Hanna Rantala and Jonathan Oatis (Reuters) - Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, a new documentary seeks to shed light on the brazen airport murder and the involvement of the two young women accused of carrying it … Mercifully, White’s straightforward approach forbids him from teasing out the idea that the women might actually have been more than the unwitting perpetrators of a perversely brilliant scheme. Later, as the film dips into flashbacks with the analytical logic of a legal case, we’ll learn how difficult it was for her to earn that happy-go-lucky veneer. Get The Latest IndieWire Alerts And Newsletters Delivered Directly To Your Inbox. Assassins premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival in the Documentary Premieres section. The women said they thought they were part of a reality prank show and did not know they were poisoning Kim. All rights reserved. ASSASSINS Director Reveals How He Obtained Footage of Kim Jong-nam’s Murder. Doan Thi Huong was 28 and from Vietnam and Siti Aisyah was a 25 year-old Indonesian. Related While the second half of “Assassins” unfolds across a court trial, the first half introduces the story by sharing any relevant information in much the same order as the world first received it. Assassins review - a gripping, must-see true-crime documentary Siti seems innocent. “They’re both lovely and thankfully survived this experience, but I think their lives will never be the same, unfortunately,” he said. 'Assassins': Release date, plot, trailer and all you need to know about Kim Jong-nam assassination documentary The two women accused of the crime are the subjects of the latest documentary from Ryan White, 'Assassins' coming to virtual cinemas in December (Reuters) – Nearly four years after the assassination of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong Nam, a new documentary seeks to … Assassins is a 2020 American documentary film, directed and produced by Ryan White.It talks about the Assassination of Kim Jong-nam and the two assassins who were tricked.. New Movies: Release Calendar for March 5, Plus Where to Watch the Latest Films Prosecutors dropped a murder charge against Huong, who pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of causing harm using dangerous means, and she went free the following May.