LEE Chang-dong’s Cannes selection Poetry took home four trophies at this year’s Grand Bell Awards. The film earned top honors winning the Best Picture Award that the director last took in 2000 with Peppermint Candy(1999).  The film also won the Best Actress Award for the critically acclaimed performance of veteran YOON Jeong-hee, Best Supporting Actor and Best Screenplay.  Written by the director, Poetry also won Best Screenplay at Cannes this year.

Thriller Moss also took home four awards including the Best Director Awardfor KANG Woo-seok.  The film which stayed at number 1 at the Korean box office for three weeksalso won the Best Photography, Best Sound and Best Art Direction awards.  Other awards also went to WON Bin who won Best Actor for The Man from Nowhere and YOON Yeo-jeong who won the Best Supporting Actress for her performance in IM Sang-soo’s remake of The Housemaid.  Island slasher horror Bedeviled, which also premiered at Cannes garnered JANG Chul-soo the Best New Director Award.  For commemorations of achievements to Korean cinema, veteran Korean actress CHOI Eun-hee received honors for a lifetime that included abduction to North Korea and subsequent escape back south.

The Grand Bell Awards, which are known as Korea’s Academy Awards, began in 1962 and has continued, albeit with interruptions, until today.

David Oxenbridge