HOW TO HANDLE NORTH KOREA: SEND IN THE STYLISTS
Watching the action movie, Stealth, its impossible not to notice that the film-makers' quest for accuracy includes the almost uncannily perfect portrayal of North Korean style. When Jessica Biel crashes only twelve miles north of the South Korean border, it is apparent that her figure-hugging pants, complete with tight bondage straps, and sexy crop top put to shame the shapeless, baggy outfits worn by the local women. Even with a gimpy leg and blood on her face, Ms. Biel manages to make aviator fatigues look like the sort of thing you'd want your lap dancer to grind against you.

Enter the Bad Guy, complete with the worst pudding-basin haircut you could ever imagine. It's a well know fact that Kim Jong Il's hairstyle has all the appeal of an exploded mattress and clearly hasn't seen a comb since Vidal Sassoon closed his Pyonyang salon. In contrast, Bad Guy had his entire head shaved except for a black circle right on top, looking for all the world like a licorice pancake.

The rest of the North Korean army had the sense to wear hats, thus hiding whatever god-awful cuts existed beneath. The green fatigues are presumably standard, but would a little color not help? Seriously, dudes, just wearing the hats at a jaunty angle might indicate a little nonconformity.

So here's the plan: Under cover of darkness, a crack team of stylists parachutes in somewhere 20 miles outside Pyongyang, armed with a small arsenal of scissors, clippers, make-up, and hair product. With nothing more technologically sophisticated that a blow dryer, they open up a small salon and begin the transformation process, introducing the rural North Koreans to such things as foundation, conditioner, gel, pomade, pore cleanser, and combs.

Pretty soon, the elite squad open a second salon (property prices in North Korea are not exactly high) and move closer to the capital city. Eventually, as people begin to look better, they demand the right to stay looking good and the right to buy imported Paul Mitchell and Vidal Sassoon.

The coup de grace is when Stacy and Clinton from TLC's What Not To Wear crash one of Kim Jong Il's nuclear strategy meetings and offer him a $5000 Visa card with a trip to New York for shopping. We can consolidate the victory by having the Queer Eye guys do a follow-up one year later.

GQ Guy - changing the world one outfit at a time.