Along with Kim Kiduk, Hong Sangsoo and Bong Joonho, Park is one of the best well-known Korean film directors on the international film festival circuit and among foreign filmmakers. Born in 1963, he was a philosophy major at Seogang University when he decided to start a film club, with which he began to write film reviews and other articles on cinema. Although he had intended to keep working as a critic, he decided to be a film director after watching Alfred Hitchcock’s &l...More

Along with Kim Kiduk, Hong Sangsoo and Bong Joonho, Park is one of the best well-known Korean film directors on the international film festival circuit and among foreign filmmakers. Born in 1963, he was a philosophy major at Seogang University when he decided to start a film club, with which he began to write film reviews and other articles on cinema. Although he had intended to keep working as a critic, he decided to be a film director after watching Alfred Hitchcock’s <Vertigo> as part of the film club activities. As he dedicated himself fully to that pursuit, he worked as an assistant director on several projects and earned his first credit as a first assistant director in Yoo Youngjin’s <Gam-Dong> (1988). On Kwak Jaeyong’s debut feature <A Sketch of a Rainy Day> (1989), he not only served as a first assistant director, he also co-penned the script. His first two films as a director, <The Moon Is What The Sun Dreams OF> (1992) and <Trio> (1997) failed to generate much market or critical response, and he was not given an opportunity to direct for many years. His comeback came with the success of <Joint Security Area/JSA> (2001), the touching story of a friendship between South and North Korean soldiers. Park’s movie career subsequently hit the fast track to stardom. Each installment of his vengeance trilogy, <Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance> (2002), <Old Boy>, and <Sympathy for Lady Vengeance> (2005) was a hit. <Old Boy>, in particular, created a sensation by winning the Grand Prix at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, the most significant international award for any Korean movie up until that point. Park also published books such as ‘Park Chanwook’s Montage,’ a collection of essays and critiques he wrote over the years. One of the rare directors loved in art circles and the film industry alike, Park is so widely recognized that he even received endorsement offers. As the head of his own film studio Moho Film, he produced Bong Joonho’s new film, <Snow Piercer>. He took on a new challenge with his following feature <Stoker>. Featuring Nicole Kidman, Mia Wasikowska and Matthew Goode, it was filmed in the US and debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2013. Returning to Korean soil, he made the Colonial Era thriller <The Handmaiden> with Kim Taeri in her first feature role in 2016. Based on the Sarah Waters novel <Fingersmith>, the film earned him his third invitation to the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival. In 2018, he moved to television with the 6-part miniseries <The Little Drummer Girl> for the BBC, based on the eponymous novel by John le Carré. He was invited again to Cannes in 2022 with his latest film <Decision To Leave>, for which he won the award for Best Director. Next for him is another English-language TV series based on a novel, this time Viet Thanh Nguyen’s <The Sympathizer>.Less