Resurrection of the Little Match Girl (Movie - 2002)

Korean Films at the 59th Cannes Film Festival

Source | 2006/05/09 | 0 comments | Permalink |

Yoon Jong-bin
The Unforgiven in Un Certain Regard

First-time feature director Yoon Jong-bin makes his international debut in the Un Certain Regard at this year's Cannes. His film is about two boyhood friends who meet during their mandatory military service and later experience the tragic consequences of habitual violence in the army. With its steady and non-self-indulgent approach to drama, the film made its world premiere at the Pusan International Film Festival to accolades from critics and audiences alike, garnering invitations from the world's most prestigious festivals.

The Unforgiven was originally 27 year-old Yoon Jong-bin's graduation film from the Film Studies Department at Chung-Ang University, based on his experiences while serving in the army himself. "Every Korean man that does military service has experiences like this", says Yoon, referringto the bullying and violence. "It's not a special story. If you are a man and live in Korean society, you can't live apart fro...| More

The 40th PESARO International Film Festival to hold Korean film director Jang Sun-woo's retrospective

Source | 2005/06/02 | 0 comments | Permalink |

Following the Lotterdam Film Festival, the Netherlands, in 1997 and The Sanfransico Asian Film Festival, the U.S., the 40th PESARO International Film Festival, scheduled to be held from June 25 through July 3 in Italy, holds Korean film director Jang Sun-woo's retrospective.

Jang Sun-woo (b. 1952) is undoubtedly one of the most relevant and distinctive voices in contemporary Korean cinema.

Since his debut feature, Seoul Jesus (1986), co-directed with Wan Son-u, his works have always displayed an incessant need to find and explore new resources in the language of cinema, and have often questioned audiences about controversial issues in Korean society.

In the early 90s his films began to acquire international recognition, thus contributing to the detection of the first signs of a renewal in Korean cinema.

In 1994, Hwaomkyung was awarded the Alfred Bauer Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival; in 1996, the International Film Festival Rotterdam chose Jang as one of i...| More

Parody gone wrong in 'Match Girl'

Source | 2004/10/08 | 0 comments | Permalink |

They say that the secret of producing a commercially, not to mention artistically, successful parody film is to use the sillier aspects of your target genre as a source of creative inspiration to write a screenplay chock-o-block full of in-jokes, references and send-ups of the cliches.
Fortunately for us, auteur Jang Sun-woo ("Lies") was attending film school on the day they lectured on how to produce a movie that parodies the self-importance of a big-budgeted blockbuster such as "The Matrix". The only problem is that he must have fallen asleep after the first five minutes, because "Resurrection of the Little Match Girl" (2002) is an absolute debacle, so thoroughly bad that it makes for fascinating viewing.

Opening with a hilarious grainy sequence, which feels like a homage to Lars Von Trier's ("Dogville") silent film-making technique, we are informed that "This film is based on a poem", before being treated to a re-enactment of Hans Christian Anderson's "The Little Match Girl"...| More

Dolls Frighten Moviegoers in Upcoming Film

Source | 2004/06/03 | 0 comments | Permalink |

By Kim Tae-jong
Staff Reporter
Many horror movies are scheduled to screen at local theaters this summer, including one currently in production featuring dolls that is sure to terrify moviegoers.

Directed by Jung Yong-ki and starring Lim Eun-kyeong, the movie "Inhyongsa (Doll Master)" is a story about a series of murders that occur in a doll museum.

"This movie is different from other horror films", said Lim Eun-kyong, Wednesday at a news conference held at a gallery currently holding a doll exhibition. "Many life-like dolls are used to strike the audience with terror but the movie also adopts an unusual sense of sadness".

Surrounded by a collection of 100 ball-jointed dolls at Mokkumto Gallery in Taehangno, Seoul, Lim showed a doll specially designed to resemble her that is on display at the exhibition.

"When you're alone in a room containing a doll, there is often an eerie feeling that it has moved even though you didn't touch it. The film tries to maximize o...| More

Reality bites drop-outs in 'Bad Movie'

Source | 2004/04/08 | 0 comments | Permalink |

One of the greatest criticisms of "reality" cinema is that while it claims to picture things "the way they are", more often than not it is simply a vehicle for expressing middle-class and patriarchal values, or worse still, the ideology of one director or writer.

In "Bad Movie", director Jang Sun-woo ("Resurrection of the Little Match Girl" and "Lies") avoids these pitfalls by handing control of the film's script over to the group of dropouts who star in this quasi-documentary about megalopolis Seoul's maggoty underbelly.

Released to a maelstrom of critical and social controversy in 1997, "Bad Movie" follows the lives of juvenile delinquents who roam the streets of Seoul at night and the homeless who congregate around Seoul Station. The film's story revolves around "Pretty", "Bird", "Princess" and "Red Byun", as they stagger from one disaster to another, enjoying brief interludes of happiness usually brought about by criminal good fortune (the scene in which the gang smoke a 10 ...| More