Sony Film Took Aim At North Korea's Biggest Taboo

By ERIC TALMADGE, Associated Press, Seattle Post-Intelligencer: Business
Thu, 12/18/2014 - 1:50pm

TOKYO (AP) — If the U.S. government's claim is correct that North Korea was involved in the unprecedented hack attack on Sony Pictures that scuttled Seth Rogen's latest comedy, no one can say they weren't warned. [...] nowhere could it be expected to generate more official outrage and possible reprisals than in North Korea, home to the world's most intense cult of personality, where even the hint of criticism of the ruling Kim dynasty can mean a long stint in prison and where it's a serious offense to merely crumple up a newspaper with any of the leaders' images. Izumi said its more furious reaction to "The Interview" could suggest a growing lack of confidence in its ability to keep illegal copies of foreign movies from being smuggled across its borders and viewed by ordinary North Koreans. [...] because the film didn't merely mock Kim Jong Un but portrayed his assassination — he dies in a fiery explosion set to a rendition of the Katy Perry song "Firework" — North Korea might have felt the need to respond with more than just words. Vitriolic outbursts of rage against the United States, South Korea and Japan have for decades been a mainstay of North Korea's state-run media, along with endless praise of the Kims — national founder Kim Il Sung, his son Kim Jong Il and now Kim Jong Un — as peerless leaders who enjoy nothing but the undying love and devotion of their nation. [...] since Kim Jong Un assumed power in late 2011, North Korea has responded with what some U.S.

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