[3] In 1978, Choi and her then ex-husband, movie director Shin Sang-ok, were abducted to North Korea, where they were forced to make films until they sought asylum at the U.S. embassy in Vienna in 1986.

[10][11] Choi's career began to suffer after her divorce, and she traveled to Hong Kong in 1978 to meet with a person posing as a businessman who offered to set up a new film company with her.

[5] In Hong Kong, Choi was abducted and taken to North Korea by the order of Kim Jong Il.

[13] The couple finally staged their escape in 1986 while on a trip to Vienna, where they fled to the U.S. embassy and requested political asylum.

[5] In 2015, film producer and writer Paul Fischer released an English-language biography of Choi's and Shin's lives titled A Kim Jong-Il Production: The Extraordinary True Story of a Kidnapped Filmmaker.