News

As years pass by and films rack up, it’s only natural to associate directors with certain things. And none more so than Hong Sangsoo, for whom a new release usually guarantees a hit of the old. That the South Korean’s latest strips away some––if not all––of those associations is thus some kind of radical act. Premiering in Berlinale Encounters, In Water follows a director, Seoung-mo (Shin Seok-ho), his cameraman, Sang-guk (Ha Seong-guk), and actress, Nam-hee (Kim Seung-yun), as they scout locations in a seaside town. There is no Kim Min-hee, there is hardly any soju, and for the first time since Woman is the Future of Man, there isn’t a single camera zoom.

Hong’s work has never shied from self-reflection––his cinema is populated by artists and filmmakers––but with In Water he digs a little deeper. As Seoung-mo and crew look for places...

Hong Sang-soo has directed over twenty films. His debut feature “The Day a Pig Fell into the Well” (1996) won the Tiger Award in Rotterdam while several of his next films including “Woman Is the Future of Man” (2004), “Tale of Cinema” (2005) and “The Day After” (2017) were selected at the Cannes film festival, while “Hahaha” won the Prix Un Certain Regard at 2010. At Locarno, “Our Sunhi” (2013) won the Pardo d’oro for Best Director while “Right Now, Wrong Then” (2015) earned Hong Sang-soo the Pardo d’oro – Concorso internazionale. His 2020 film “The Woman Who Ran” won him the Silver Bear for Best Director at the 70th Berlin International Film Festival. In our Best Asian Films of 2020 list, “The Woman Who Ran” was voted as the third best.

His distinct style of people drinking and discussing fervently, men appearing as lowlifes, subtle but timely humor, along with the sudden, occasionally double zoom-ins and the...

PARIS -- Korean director Hong Sang-soo's A Tale of the Cinema will complete the lineup of films In Competition at the Festival de Cannes, organizers said Tuesday. Hong brought his film Woman Is the Future of Man to the Croisette last year. Also, two more films have been added to the Un Certain Regard sidebar. Eli, Eli, Lema Sabachthani, from Japan's Aoyama Shinji, and Marock, a France/Morocco co-production from Laila Marrakchi, complete the lineup. Marock will compete for the Camera d'Or. Organizers also announced a special screening of the documentary Darshan -- l'Etreinte, from Netherlands-born Jan Kounen (Blueberry). Selected extracts from Jean-Luc Godard's "Histoire(s) du Cinema" will be presented by the official selection and Critics' Week, and Pele Eterno (Pele Forever), a documentary by Anibal Massaini Neto, will be screened under the Cinema de la Plage (Beach Cinema) banner.

SEOUL -- Cheongeorahm Film has signed a $1.7 million investment deal with Happinet Pictures in Japan to produce six features. It is the first time a Korean film company has signed such a multipicture deal with a foreign investor. The six films include the newest works by Bong Joon-ho (Memories of Murder), Hong Sang-soo (Woman Is the Future of Man), and Kim Kyeong-hyeong (My Tutor Friend). Korea's film exports have been soaring in recent years, going from less than $1 million in 1998 to over $34 million in 2003. The Korea Trade Assn. estimates that exports are on track to double once again in 2004. Cheongeorahm also recently added Kim Ki-duk's latest film, Iron 3, to its distribution lineup, giving the young film company one of the deepest rosters of directing talent in Korea.

SEOUL, South Korea -- Despite a five-year boom that has taken the Korean film industry to commercial heights almost unprecedented around the world, the small East Asian nation has yet to make much of an impact at Cannes -- at least before this year. With two films In Competition this year as well as many others screening Out of Competition and in the short-film section, Korean cinema comes to Cannes with its strongest presence ever at the festival and market. Park Chan-wook's Oldboy, In Competition, is a twisted, rich story of obsession and revenge as a man is imprisoned for 15 years without any explanation. When he is finally released, he must find out who was responsible and why he was imprisoned. The other Competition entry, Hong Sang-soo's Woman Is the Future of Man, could not be more different. It's a quiet and warmly quirky tale of two men who meet up for the first time in seven years. Over the course of dinner and drinks, they recall a woman whom they both once dated and decide to find out what has happened to her in the intervening years.