About

Neil George is a British documentary filmmaker whose work explores identity and the lived realities of displacement. Born in Exeter, England, his career spans both broadcast television and independent documentary, with a sustained focus on human rights and socially engaged storytelling.

He began his career in television, producing and directing over 100 programmes for Sky during the 2000s. In 2011, he moved to South Korea to teach film production at a media university near Seoul—an experience that marked a shift in his practice toward documentary filmmaking rooted in lived experience and cultural immersion.

During this period, he directed several films engaging with Korean society and history, including While They Watched (2015), which examines the lives of North Korean defectors, and Beyond the Picture: The Story of Sohn Kee Chung (2015). His work developed further with After the Sewol (2016), a long-term documentary project exploring the aftermath of the Sewol ferry disaster, followed by Crossroads, which continued this exploration of collective trauma and memory.

In 2018, he began collaborating with UNHCR on Our Journey, a series documenting Yemeni refugees seeking asylum on Jeju Island. This work formed part of a broader engagement with refugee narratives, including Writing to Reach You (2020), which follows individuals rebuilding their lives in South Korea.

In 2022, he was commissioned by UNHCR to direct Dodomu, a documentary on Ukrainian refugees in Poland, narrated by Jung Woo Sung. Completed in 2023, the film has been screened internationally at festivals and human rights events.

Now based in London, Neil George is a doctoral researcher at University College London (UCL). His practice-based PhD investigates how documentary and virtual reality can expand forms of storytelling around displacement, with a particular focus on creating immersive experiences that foster deeper public understanding of refugee lives.

Across his work, he is concerned with how film can move beyond observation toward encounter—creating space for voices that are often marginalised, and exploring new ways of representing lived experience.