2009: Lost Memories

[VidaLaVida]

Has anyone else seen this movie? If so, what are your thoughts?

While looking for good AH movies, I managed to come across this movie. It's a South Korean film released in 2002, and it's one of the few films I've seen that take a truly serious stab at creating an alternate history universe.

The POD is 1909, when then-Japanese Resident-General of Korea Ito Hirobumi survives his assassination by Korean nationalist An Jung-guen. From then on, the Japanese Empire continues to tighten its hold on its Asian colonies, most prominently (for the story's purpose) Korea. Japan also avoids the conflicts that would lead to its downfall, allying with the United States during WWII, while still expanding its empire. By the war's end, Imperial Japan has remained a major world military power, with an empire spread throughout Asia. The story itself is set in Seoul in ATL 2009, where indigenous Korean culture has been all but extinguished, and the entire peninsula has essentially been Japanized.

See the movie's intro timeline and opening scene for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--GdDrkp6IE

Personally, I mostly enjoyed the film, because I think it's nice to see an attempt at serious alternate history in major movies. There were some flaws: I would think that a Japanese society that was never defeated in World War II and retained its imperialistic culture would look just a little bit different from the OTL-style cute cartoon advertisements and bilingual Japanese/English street signs that you can see in the opening scene.

But aside from that, it's a nice story. It's also, on its own, a pretty interesting examination on how South Koreans still view their own grudges against Japan. It gave me the impression that not all is water under the bridge yet, to say the least.

 

[jkarr]

Has anyone else seen this movie? If so, what are your thoughts?

While looking for good AH movies, I managed to come across this movie. It's a South Korean film released in 2002, and it's one of the few films I've seen that take a truly serious stab at creating an alternate history universe.

The POD is 1909, when then-Japanese Resident-General of Korea Ito Hirobumi survives his assassination by Korean nationalist An Jung-guen. From then on, the Japanese Empire continues to tighten its hold on its Asian colonies, most prominently (for the story's purpose) Korea. Japan also avoids the conflicts that would lead to its downfall, allying with the United States during WWII, while still expanding its empire. By the war's end, Imperial Japan has remained a major world military power, with an empire spread throughout Asia. The story itself is set in Seoul in ATL 2009, where indigenous Korean culture has been all but extinguished, and the entire peninsula has essentially been Japanized.

See the movie's intro timeline and opening scene for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=--GdDrkp6IE

Personally, I mostly enjoyed the film, because I think it's nice to see an attempt at serious alternate history in major movies. There were some flaws: I would think that a Japanese society that was never defeated in World War II and retained its imperialistic culture would look just a little bit different from the OTL-style cute cartoon advertisements and bilingual Japanese/English street signs that you can see in the opening scene.

But aside from that, it's a nice story. It's also, on its own, a pretty interesting examination on how South Koreans still view their own grudges against Japan. It gave me the impression that not all is water under the bridge yet, to say the least.

uit was good yea...but the alliance between the us-japan in ww2...its never explained why japan, a imperialist and somewhat hardliner right wing like germany was, allied with the us....and if they were allied, why would the us get involved in ww2 at all?...japans imperial expansion over the pacific was the predominant reason why the us went to war with them...also its never explained what happened with brtiian in the pacific, russia and china

also i found the whole plot device of using a ancient korean temple stone a a magical time portal kinda silly....i wish they had the divergent point just what happened, not otl to start with, but then the korean group go back in tiem to change things...mightve being better, or at least have the time portal man made rather than mystical


overall though i did enjoy the film

 

[Sumeragi]

also i found the whole plot device of using a ancient korean temple stone a a magical time portal kinda silly....i wish they had the divergent point just what happened, not otl to start with, but then the korean group go back in tiem to change things...mightve being better, or at least have the time portal man made rather than mystical

The novel that gave the producers the idea for the movie was a regular POD novel, with Ito surviving the "assassination attempt".

 

[VidaLaVida]

uit was good yea...but the alliance between the us-japan in ww2...its never explained why japan, a imperialist and somewhat hardliner right wing like germany was, allied with the us....and if they were allied, why would the us get involved in ww2 at all?...japans imperial expansion over the pacific was the predominant reason why the us went to war with them...also its never explained what happened with brtiian in the pacific, russia and china

also i found the whole plot device of using a ancient korean temple stone a a magical time portal kinda silly....i wish they had the divergent point just what happened, not otl to start with, but then the korean group go back in tiem to change things...mightve being better, or at least have the time portal man made rather than mystical


overall though i did enjoy the film

True, but at the same time, it seemed like using the magic/ASB technique of the time-travelling Korean artificat was the best way to explain the inconsistiencies in your first paragraph. Regarding Japan's decision to join the Allies, for example, as the movie describes toward the end *highlight for spoilers*

The Japanese guard who killed Jung-guen was actually a Japanese time-traveller from OTL, sent to prevent the fall of the Japanese Empire. He used his prestige from saving Hirobumi's life in order to rise in the ranks and guide Japan towards avoiding the strategic mistakes it made in OTL.

But yeah, there were other problems that seem difficult to address. Like you said, what got the U.S. involved in World War II when their primary antagonist was no longer provoking them? How did WWII last as long as it did, now that Nazi Germany would've quite literally been fighting the entire world?

Overall, though, those are little things that I'm willing to excuse.

 

[tormsen]

The novel that gave the producers the idea for the movie was a regular POD novel, with Ito surviving the "assassination attempt".

I had no idea it was a book, I gotta search this out.

 

[tormsen]

Hmmm, from what the Korean version of the genocide tells me, it looks like they basically ripped off the PoD but added time travel and silliness. The cads.

 

[Sumeragi]

I had no idea it was a book, I gotta search this out.

The title is 비명을 찾아서, and is set in 1987.

Hmmm, from what the Korean version of the genocide tells me, it looks like they basically ripped off the PoD but added time travel and silliness. The cads.

Yes, and the original author filed a suit for plagiarism, but lost.


Anyway, one thing you should know is that in this world, the Empire of Japan controls Korea, Manchuria, Taiwan, coastal China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Northern Borneo, and a large chunk of the east coast of Russia. Could be that the Unholy Alliance of Germany and USSR happened or something, and that after the war, the Philippines joined the Empire of Japan as a commonwealth or something.

 

[tormsen]

Yeah, I found it in the Korea University library so I'm going to go get it out. No guarantees as to how long it takes me to read it, though

Every heard of this one: 스탈린의 편지?

For those who can't read hangul: two PoDs, What if there had been a Soviet representative in the UN to block it sending troops to support South Korea against the North? + What if Harry Truman hadn't kicked MacArthur to the curb?

The setting seems interesting. US goes into Korea alone and MacArthur get's his crazy nuclear wishes and the Korean War is instead known as the Northeast Asian War ITTL. Korea ends up in a North Asian Federation along with Tibet, Uighurstan, Mongolia and Manchuria, while mainland China is taken back by the KMT and called "Free China". That's all the setting Wiki has, so I'm going to have to track that one down as well.

 

[Sumeragi]

Yeah, I found it in the Korea University library so I'm going to go get it out. No guarantees as to how long it takes me to read it, though

Every heard of this one: 스탈린의 편지?

For those who can't read hangul: two PoDs, What if there had been a Soviet representative in the UN to block it sending troops to support South Korea against the North + What f Harry Truman hadn't kicked MacArthur to the curb.

The setting seems interesting. US goes into Korea alone and MacArthur get's his crazy nuclear wishes and the Korean War is instead known as the Northeast Asian War ITTL. Korea ends up in a North Asian Federation along with Tibet, Uighurstan, Mongolia and Manchuria, while mainland China is taken back by the KMT and called "Free China". That's all the setting Wiki has, so I'm going to have to track that one down as well.

I did make a thread about it, which almost no one bothered to reply to.

Let's continue on with separate discussions by PM.

 

[Alamo]

But yeah, there were other problems that seem difficult to address. Like you said, what got the U.S. involved in World War II when their primary antagonist was no longer provoking them? How did WWII last as long as it did, now that Nazi Germany would've quite literally been fighting the entire world?

Overall, though, those are little things that I'm willing to excuse.

Well, considering that according to that snippet, World War 2 started in 1936 (or at least the US entered the war in 1936), and that Japan didn't get involved in Manchuria until 1943, I think that it's safe to say that this timeline would be radically different then our own, and that changes in Korea would be just a drop in the bucket. Maybe the Bolshevik revolution spread across Europe in the 1920s, and the US enters the war against the communists. Maybe the Russian Revolution never occurs and Russia goes Fascist, and eventually allies with Germany. Perhaps WW1 never occurred, at least in a way recognizable to us.

Maybe in Japan, the fledgling democratic movements of the 1920s were never crushed and by the 1930s Japan is a functional democracy and major trade partner of the US, seen as a valuable partner in the war against the Communists/Fascists/space aliens that the US is fighting, who knows.