The Gwangju Democratic Uprising sets the scene for one of the biggest Korean films of the year, as JANG Hun’s A Taxi Driver is rolling up for its August 2nd release date with SONG Kang-ho in the lead. But what sets this story apart, with its fiercely local setting, is the presence of German co-star Thomas Kretschmann (The Pianist, Downfall, Avengers: Age of Ultron), who takes on the most high profile role ever by a Western actor in a Korean language film.

Kretschmann plays a German reporter who arrives in Seoul in May 1980 after hearing about the unrest taking place in Gwangju. He hires SONG’s cab to drive him there and together the pair enter one of the most painful chapters of Korean history. During a visit to Seoul last week to promote the film’s release, Kretschmann sat down with KoBiz to discuss his unique experience of working on the Korean blockbuster.

We tried to make it more spicy. First of all, I had my own experience already, from the first lunch I had on the first shooting day. They asked me if they should get something different, but I said “No, no, no! I eat everything you eat.” After half an hour I started to sweat profoundly and JANG Hun said “We cannot give him this food, the makeup is disappearing.” (laughs)

When we shot that scene it wasn’t spicy so I was acting as if it was hot but he wanted to see me sweat so we tried to make it spicy. I had the spicy food but the heat comes slowly so after 20 minutes you really begin to sweat, but by then the take is over. So they made it very spicy but it didn’t work as well as in my private life.

I tried. For once in my life I tried to go method. It didn’t work.

 

I was there for four months. We shot according to the weather, which was rough. It was either hot or raining, or both. We constantly moved all across the country. I remember spending more time in a car on the highway than on set. It was so hot and everyone was sweating bullets. Me even more so as I wasn’t used to it. 

Or so I thought!

I thought that they are lucky to get me because that’s my specialty, shooting in different countries and languages, in cultures that are not my own. I love doing that and I thought if someone is a pro at that, it’s me. But I really met my limit. It was completely different and I was not expecting it to be that foreign to me. First of all was the language barrier. I’m working with actors who don’t understand what I’m saying and I don’t understand them. I had a director who didn’t understand what I was saying. Not only was he an interpreting, he also needed to judge my acting in a language that he doesn’t understand. I was shocked at how precise he was but also how well he could smell which was the right take. He gave me little notes and I thought to myself “how does he know this?”

Not really. I learned a couple of phrases but with Korean for me it was so hard that I couldn’t ever understand when a sentence finishes. For acting this was hard as I had to understand the rhythm. When do I start talking? In Italian, French Spanish, even Russian, I understand when someone is finished with their sentence. In Korean, no chance.

It was a challenge to be natural. I had to sit in front of the camera and be natural and emotional but at the same time very technical and find a system where I could fit myself into their system. 

I got the script from my agency, read it and I liked it right away. First of all because the script was very good. For me it’s very simple, I like a script or I don’t. I want to see the movie or I don’t. Then Director JANG and Producer PARK (PARK Un-kyoung of production company The Lamp) visited me in Los Angeles and I thought to myself that that was quite a trip to come and meet an actor. I felt humbled that they came over and during our first interaction, as I always say, we smelt each other. I knew right away, and he told me later on that he did too.

 

I had no idea and I felt like an idiot. Usually I know quite a bit about what’s going on in the world. I didn’t know about Jurgen Hinzpeter (Kretschmann’s character), I didn’t know about anything. When people asked me what I was doing and I told them, nobody knew about it. Did you?

Strange isn’t it? Because it’s such a big event that formed the country as it is. Yet not so many people know about it, and that’s part of the story.

Well, that prepared me for life in general. After I escaped I could very well have been shot or ended up in prison. So when I confront people with problems now I say “So you wanna shoot me? You can’t. Go f**k yourself.” That’s my attitude now. (laughs) It makes it easier to go through life. It probably made it easier for me to imagine situations and environments like that and how to operate.

I think he was a very good person. He was a soldier of truth, which to me was his motivation. He was very interested in human rights so I tried pay tribute to that with my acting.

I don’t think the political environment is a problem to pick up on. It’s more about the culture and how people talk and react to each other. For example, the film starts with one of the most iconic Korean songs (CHO Young-pil’s Short Hair). So when a local viewer watches the film they are immediately thrown into that time. For me it sounds like tacky Asian disco but its emotional for local viewers. One woman I spoke to said it brought her back to her childhood, when she just wanted to marry that singer. There’s a barrier with the culture, but not with the subject, which is universal. 

Not a lot. I knew Korean cinema was top among Asian cinemas and of course I knew about PARK Chan-wook’s films. I’m a fan of Old Boy (2003) and Stoker (2013), which visually is amazing. Other than that I didn’t know much but that was another reason for me to do the film, as I’m interested in anything I don’t know about.