Song Joong-ki is set to play a North Korean defector for the first time while up-and-coming actress Choi Sung-eun will star as his love interest in the Netflix film
Fresh out of the global success of the 2022 K-drama Reborn Rich, Song Joong-ki is set to grace the screens once again for Netflix’s My Name Is Loh Kiwan, a film he was rumoured to be starring in five years ago, which his then agency initially denied.
Song, who recently announced his marriage to Katy Louise Saunders, will star alongside rising star Choi Sung-eun. The film follows the story of Loh Kiwan, a North Korean defector who slipped away to Belgium in pursuit of freedom and falls in love with a woman named Mari.
Here are three things we know about the upcoming film.
1. The story
My Name Is Loh Kiwan is based on Cho Hae-jin's poignant short novel I Met Loh Kiwan, a 2013 Shin Dong-yup Prize for Literature winner.
The captivating story follows North Korean defector Loh Kiwan from North Hamgyong Province, who arrives in Belgium, a place where he doesn't speak the language or understand the customs, and with nothing to his name. In hopes of survival, he seeks to settle down in the country but the only way he can do so is to receive the refugee status from the Belgium government.
See also: Netflix: 5 K-dramas and films that cast a spotlight on North Korea
As he struggles to make his way and find a home in an unfamiliar world, all while experiencing the pain of exile, he meets Mari, a former Korean shooter born in Belgium who has lost her will to live. They have an unpleasant first meeting but eventually fall in love with each other and a remarkable romance unfolds.