Korean film is still on its upswing, and from a film or movie-going experience, from Seoul to Cannes, it is not merely a string of hits. \u00a0Three Korean movie directors are at the forefront of the movement. \u00a0What makes Korean film punch above its weight internationally?<\/p>\n
If it is not his actual films, then it is Park Chan-wook’s style. \u00a0If it is not the Korean horror film genre or its unique version of messed up and quirky, then it is Kim Ji-woon’s intensity which influences. \u00a0And, just to make sure Seoul doesn’t sell out to Hollywood, there is Kim Ki-duk lurking in the background and popping up in film festivals across Europe and Asia, winning quite often. \u00a0These Korean directors are what is keeping the Korean movie style keep coming, but also has fresh art house and wide audience productions they are directly and indirectly involved in.<\/p>\n
PARK CHAN-WOOK<\/strong><\/p>\n Anything by Park Chan-wook is a must see. Thirst \ubc15\uc950, winner of the 2009 Cannes \u201cJury Prize\u201d.\u00a0 Park Chan-wook\u2019s (Old Boy \uc62c\ub4dc\ubcf4\uc774<\/em>\u20142004 Cannes Grand Prize Winner) vampire film stars Song Kang-ho as a priest-turned-vampire who seduces his friend\u2019s wife, played by rising starlet Kim Ok-bin.\u00a0 His English\/Hollywood production Stoker, starring Nicole Kidman and Mia Wasikowska, is love-it or hate-it film and broke even at the box office.\u00a0 Any Korean would know Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance<\/em> (\ubcf5\uc218\ub294 \ub098\uc758 \uac83<\/em>)\u00a0 and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance<\/em> (\uce5c\uc808\ud55c \uae08\uc790\uc528<\/em>), which are bookends to Old Boy in the Vengeance Trilogy.<\/p>\n Park also made a quirky romance comedy called I’m a Cyborg, But That’s OK<\/em> (\uc2f8\uc774\ubcf4\uadf8\uc9c0\ub9cc \uad1c\ucc2e\uc544<\/em>).\u00a0 His next film will be a Korean adaptation based on the novel Fingersmith, about an heiress who falls in love with a thief.\u00a0 The film stars Ha Jung-woo and the very popular Kim Min-hee.<\/p>\n KIM JI-WOON<\/strong><\/p>\n Also, if you have the stomach for it, try I Saw the Devil<\/em> (\uc545\ub9c8\ub97c \ubcf4\uc558\ub2e4<\/em>, 2010), by Kim Ji-woon (\uae40\uc9c0\uc6b4), who followed the Hollywood interest set by those before him when he directed Arnold Schwarzenegger in The Last Stand.\u00a0 Rolling Stone magazine considered I Saw the Devil a “new grindhouse classic” and made it number 24 on its list of the “25 Best Modern Exploitation Movies”.<\/a>\u00a0 Kim also saw box office success, and received good reviews at Cannes, with The Good, The Bad, The Weird<\/em> (\uc88b\uc740 \ub188, \ub098\uc05c \ub188, \uc774\uc0c1\ud55c \ub188<\/em>), which, unlike the other two films, he also wrote.<\/p>\n But for more intense work, his 2003 film, A Tale of Two Sisters<\/em> (\uc7a5\ud654, \ud64d\ub828<\/em>), was the highest-grossing Korean horror film at the time.\u00a0 The film, remade in the US in 2009 as The Uninvited, is about twin sisters who experience more and more strange events involving them and their stepmother after returning from a psychiatric ward.\u00a0 The story line sounds trite today.\u00a0 But the movie is based on a tradition Joseon (\uc870\uc120) Dynasty Korean folktale called The Story of Janghwa and Hongryeon<\/em>\u00a0(\uc7a5\ud654\ud64d\ub828\uc804). \u00a0The tale has had several adaptions\u00a0but none have reached this kind of success or level of creepy<\/a> (clicker beware).<\/p>\n The Independent Film Channel listed it number four on their list of the “The 10 Best Split Personality Performances in Movies.”\u00a0 It was one of the first films, and the first horror film to put Korean filmmaking on the map–although you could say the 1960 cult classic The Housemaid<\/em> (\ud558\ub140), remade in 2010, did that, a film favorite of Quentin Tarantino and Martin Scorsese.\u00a0 But it was director like Kim Ji-woon, Park Chan-wook and Na Hong-jin who started the new interest in Hollywood for what is going on in Korean theaters, keeping the interest and funding alive for what is a thriving industry from art house to major features.<\/p>\n KIM KI-DUK<\/strong><\/p>\n Saving the best for last, Kim Ki-duk (\uae40\uae30\ub355) is the most decorated of these Korean directors. \u00a0He continually dominates the top three international film festivals–Cannes, Venice, Berlin. \u00a0He won Best Director at Berlin and Venice in 2004 with two different films. \u00a0He won in the tough Un Certain Regard category in Cannes in 2011 with a documentary, and followed it up in 2012 with the coveted and elusive Golden Lion, the top film award, at Venice. \u00a0That film,\u00a0Pieta\u00a0<\/em>(\ud53c\uc5d0\ud0c0<\/em>), became the first Korean film to win a top film award at on the top 3 festivals. \u00a0The film, named after the Italian word for “piety”, still runs along the typical Korean course of a debt, a debtor, and a strong female presence who gives a moral and purposeful drive for the protagonist.<\/p>\n Kim Ki-duk started in 1995 with his first (submitted) screenplay,\u00a0Crocodile<\/em> (\uc545\uc5b4<\/em>), a standard odd Korean film dealing with suicide and sexual abuse. \u00a0The violent sexual themes continued with\u00a0Samaritan<\/em> (\uc0ac\ub9c8\ub9ac\uc544<\/em>), which brought him success at Berlin in 2004. \u00a0That same year, in his Venice success, Ki-duk’s film 3-Iron<\/i> or\u00a0Empty House<\/em> (\ube48\uc9d1<\/em>), showed Ki-duk was one of Korea’s most important directors.<\/p>\n However, it was his Cannes film,\u00a0Arirang<\/em> (\uc544\ub9ac\ub791<\/em>), which showed how Ki-duk’s films took a real turn and a serious mental toll. \u00a0The documentary deals with a near hanging of one of his lead actress and the young death of two of his close colleagues, including one who worked as assistant director on his previous films.<\/p>\n His newest film came out this summer,\u00a0Stop<\/em> (\uc2a4\ud1b1<\/i>),\u00a0<\/em>takes a different yet still somewhat horrific turn. \u00a0Yet the film, about a young married couple who are exposed to radiation at the Fukushima nuclear reactor after the 2011 meltdown, shows Kim Ki-duk is still at the top of his game<\/a>.<\/p>\n