Photo: Jesse Charlie / CC0 (source: Wikimedia Commons)
My Take
Kim Jong-il is one of those figures who is genuinely hard to look away from — not out of admiration, but sheer fascination. He ran North Korea as a hermetically sealed personal fiefdom for nearly two decades, inheriting power from his father Kim Il-sung and turning it into something even more theatrical. What always gets me is the contradiction: here was a man who reportedly held thousands of films in his private collection, published a book on cinema, and even ordered the kidnapping of a South Korean director just to improve his country's movie industry — all while presiding over famines and a gulag system that defies description. The platform shoes, the jumpsuits, the cult of personality built on propaganda so extreme it became almost surreal — history will keep dissecting this one for a very long time.
1. Profile
- Name (English)
- Kim Jong-il
- Name (Japanese)
- 金正日
- Reading
- きむ・じょんいる
- Born
- February 16, 1941 – December 17, 2011
- Zodiac / Chinese zodiac
- Aquarius / Snake
- Origin
- Vyatskoye, Russia
- Occupation
- politician / military personnel / film producer / film actor / voice actor
2. Background
- University
- Kim Il-sung University
Awards & achievements
- 1995 Jubilee Medal "50 Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- 2005 Jubilee Medal "60 Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- 2010 Jubilee Medal "65 Years of Victory in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945"
- Hero of the Republic
- 1978 Order of Kim Il Sung
- Order of the National Flag
- 2005 National Order of Merit
- 1983 Order of the Republic, 1st Class
4. Personality
Motto
Private
6. Links
- Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%87%91%E6%AD%A3%E6%97%A5
Frequently asked questions
When was Kim Jong-il born?
February 16, 1941 – December 17, 2011.
Where is Kim Jong-il from?
Kim Jong-il is from Vyatskoye, Russia.
What does Kim Jong-il do?
Kim Jong-il works as politician, military personnel, film producer, film actor, voice actor.
Politician — see all → · Military personnel — see all → · More people from Russia →
7. About this entry
Tags
- Last updated
- 2026-06-02
Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.