It may have caught the world off-guard - including the White House - but Donald Trump's shock acceptance of an invitation to meet with Kim Jong-un had already been foreseen. Photo / AP
US President Donald Trump has shocked the world after accepting an unexpected invitation to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang.
But eerily enough, a North Korean propaganda film from several years ago predicted this whole thing happening.
The film, The Country I Saw, was produced in 2012 by the DPRK's official film studio, Chosun Art Film Studio.
It tells the fictional story of how a Japanese professor becomes enamoured by North Korea's nuclear weapons, reports News.com.au.
According to 38north.org, this is not a subtle film. Japanese officials can be seen expressing their amazement at the hi-tech capabilities of North Korea, while getting frustrated at how they're perceived by the United States.
One scene features a wall map in which the entire state of South Korea does not exist. In fact, the country barely receives a mention throughout the film.
But what's most important is the film's climax, which features the dispatch of a US envoy to the hermit country. This is supposedly in order to free two journalists who have been captured, but it's actually a prelude to recognising the DPRK.
The film ends with images of former President Bill Clinton meeting with Kim Jong-il.
Foreign policy expert Jeffrey Lewis, from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, noted that North Korea has been seeking a summit with an American president for over twenty years.
"To be clear, we need to talk to North Korea," he said. "But Kim is not inviting Trump so that he can surrender North Korea's weapons. Kim is inviting Trump to demonstrate that his investment in nuclear and missile capabilities has forced the United States to treat him as an equal."
Writing about the film, Prof Lewis said the DPRK is seeking recognition for its regime in the form of "normalised relations".
"High-level contacts, such as summits and special envoys, are important evidence for North Korea that the world accepts the regime," he wrote. "The Country I Saw does much to reinforce the general view of a DPRK leadership that has set securing the legitimacy and stability of its regime as the overriding foreign policy goal.
"That a visit by Bill Clinton instead of Bill Richardson is the big reveal at the end of the movie says a lot about how North Korea sees its nuclear diplomacy."
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