1Q89

Brilliant concept. We know Ceaușescu and Kim Il Sung were close, and the fall of the Romanian regime genuinely terrified Pyongyang. Showing this moment of fear through AI is genius. It fills gaps in archives that simply don’t exist.

Dangerous. We are using AI to attribute emotions to real historical figures that we never witnessed. Is this documentary or fiction? Creating fake history under the guise of reconstruction is a slippery slope.

The film is very cold. Literally. The blue filter, the snow, the empty Pyongyang avenues. The screen radiates loneliness and paranoia. There are no dialogues, but the silence weighs heavier than a scream.

I liked how they showed the isolation. That shot of the boy against the grey building. It’s a metaphor for how a nation became hostage to one man's fear. AI perfectly captured this inhuman logic of the regime.

A complex and heavy film. It’s hard even to write about it. At first, the form strikes and delights you—how subtly and detailed the images of people, time, and space are reflected, as well as the emotions and energy. But after immersing yourself, a strong tension arises from the sensation of mass, global absurdity. A desire to close your eyes and 'unsee' the destructive senselessness in which millions live.

The "uncanny valley" is still very much there. Kim Jong Il's face looks too smooth, almost rubbery. The tech is impressive, but the soldiers' eyes are dead. It distracts from the seriousness of the subject.

It's moving pictures, not cinema. No acting, no live energy. Just an expensive slideshow generated by prompts. There is no soul in this.

This is the future of cinema! The film proves that AI isn't just an image generator, but a time machine. The detail of the snow on the boy's coat is incredible. Director Grecu uses neural networks as a new camera lens

The shot composition is flawless, almost too much so. Symmetry like Wes Anderson, but in a totalitarian hell. The red color (titles, flags, room) against the blue winter backdrop works very powerfully.

The title 1Q89 is a clear reference to Murakami (1Q84). It hints that North Korea split from our reality and went into an alternate timeline. The ghost hotel Ryugyong in the snow looks like a set piece for a dystopia.