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Category Archives: Park Chan-wook

A feast of Park Chan-wook

04-Apr-08
I'm a Cyborg, but that's OK finally gets a UK theatrical release, prior to its release on Tartan DVD at the end of May. The film, which stars hallyu superstar Rain (Jeong Ji-hoon, 정지훈) and Im Soo-jeong (임수정), received its belated London premiere last year at the Korean Film Festival at the Barbican, and returns to the ICA in Pall Mall today for the rest of April. Coinciding with the release, The ICA is also showing the Vengeance Trilogy, Sympathy for Mr Vengeance, Oldboy (the film which really got director Park noticed outside Korea) and Lady Vengeance (above, left to right, with Park on the extreme right) Lady Vengeance will be getting a separate screening at the Roxy Bar and Screen in ...
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Oldboy returns to Film 4

14-Aug-07
For those who haven't caught it already, Oldboy returns to the small screen this Friday - 11pm, 17 August, on Film 4. Related posts:Oldboy in top 20 foreign films of all time The Guardian has conducted a readers’ poll of the top...K-film blockbuster season on Film 4 I happened to channel-surf over to Film 4 as I...Jump returns to the Peacock Ye-gam Inc’s hit martial arts slapstick show returns to... Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
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Korean Film at Edinburgh

31-Jul-07
The Edinburgh Film Festival will be showing four Korean films this year. The choice of three of the four comes as no surprise. No western film festival with Korean content is complete without a recent Kim Ki-duk film, and this time round it's Breath (숨). Everyone wants to know how Park Chan-wook can follow his vengeance trilogy, so the quirky I'm a Cyborg (싸이보그지만 괜찮아) is a natural choice After A Good Lawyer's Wife (바람난 가족) and President's Last Bang (그때 그사람들), any film by Im Sang-soo deserves attention. And when the film is an adaptation of a novel by Hwang Sok-yong and deals with the Kwangju massacre, The Old Garden (오래된 정원) is certainly a candidate for any serious film festival The only ...
Also filed in Edinburgh 2007, Events news, Film, Im Sang-soo, Kim Ki-duk, Roh Gyeong-tae | | Comments (0) »

Oldboy in top 20 foreign films of all time

18-May-07
The Guardian has conducted a readers' poll of the top foreign movies of all time. Some of the usual suspects are there. Unusually, Seven Samurai doesn't come top, that particular accolade belonging to Cinema Paradiso. Amelie is second, Seven Samurai third and City of God, one of the few films I've come close to walking out of, fourth. Oldboy comes in at #17. HT to Adam over at koreanfilm.org. Links: Read the full list for yourself over at the Guardian website Guardian Film Blog post launching the survey (30 March 2007), and the discussion about the survey results (11 May 2007) Guardian interview with Park Chan-wook (8 Feb 2006) Related posts:Korean short films in Futureshorts February programme Futureshorts’ February programme is themed for Valentine’s ...
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Park’s gong

27-Feb-07
So what exactly is the Alfred Bauer prize? We know that Park Chan-wook was awarded it at the recent Berlin Film Festival for I'm a Cyborg, because there's this picture on the BBC website to prove it. Yet you read the various blogs and news websites and you get the impression that the prize is an award for the best science fiction comedy. So, in a crowded field of one, Park sweeps away all competition. Well, no. According to the official list of Berlin prizewinners, the prize is awarded "for a work of particular innovation", and if you want to be really pedantic it's awarded to the film, not the artist. Check out some of the stills from the film at HanCinema ...
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Cyborg in Berlin

11-Feb-07
For a youtube of Rain at the Berlin film festival, visit PopSeoul. Just for once, he's sporting a sensible hairstyle. But I didn't realise he was so tall (or, alternatively, Park Chan-wook so short). Related posts:Park’s gong So what exactly is the Alfred Bauer prize? We...Classic K-film in Berlin Madame Freedom (above), plus Shin Sang-ok’s “The Guest &...A feast of Park Chan-wook I’m a Cyborg, but that’s OK finally gets a... Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
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If you’re going to trash a film in a British newspaper…

20-Jun-06
... the least you can do is use British English. Mark Kermode's strange review in the Observer of Fruit Chan's full-length version of Dumplings reveals a prissiness that I don't expect of a reviewer. Cat III sleaze it is not. His comment raises the question of whether he has ever watched any Cat III sleaze. Yeuk saat? Hua jie kuang ben? (My guilty secrets are coming out here.) There's probably worse. I can remember nothing as objectionable in Dumplings when I saw it a year or so ago (why does it take so long for films to make it over here by the way?). But this is off-topic. Part of Kermode's objection to the film is the company it keeps. The shorter ...
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