Born in 1960, KIM Ki-duk studied fine arts in Paris from 1990 to 1993 before turning into a filmmaker when he won a screenplay contest by the Korean Film Council in 1995 which led to his praised debut <Crocodile> in 1996. He quickly followed that up with <Wild Animals>, which was set in Paris, before getting his first major festival invitation with his 1998 work <Birdcage Inn>, which screened at the Berlin International Film Festival. Broad international acc...More

Born in 1960, KIM Ki-duk studied fine arts in Paris from 1990 to 1993 before turning into a filmmaker when he won a screenplay contest by the Korean Film Council in 1995 which led to his praised debut <Crocodile> in 1996. He quickly followed that up with <Wild Animals>, which was set in Paris, before getting his first major festival invitation with his 1998 work <Birdcage Inn>, which screened at the Berlin International Film Festival. Broad international acclaim, as well as infamy, materialized in 2000 when his film <The Isle>, featuring some notorious scenes, debuted internationally at the Venice International Film Festival. That same year he released the experimental <Real Fiction>, a work shot in real time in one take. In 2001, his sixth film <Address Unknown> opened the Venice Film Festival, while the controversial forced prostitution film <Bad Guy> debuted at the Busan International Film Festival. He paired up with superstar JANG Dong-gun for the military drama <The Coast Guard> in 2002.

Even more success came in 2003 when he released his landmark work <Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter and Spring>. Critically praised and screened internationally, it was for many years the most successful Korean film to screen in the United States. In 2004, he won both the Silver Bear (from Berlin) and the Silver Lion (from Venice), for his works <Samaritan Girl> and <3-Iron>, another KIM film that has endured as a classic. Yet despite the international acclaim each of his films have received, following the solid returns of <Bad Guy>, his films have generally been poorly received in Korea. He has been a vocal critic of the exhibition system that allows little room for independent films in Korea and has both threatened to withdraw some of his films from release and spearheaded various initiatives to promote the distribution of local indie cinema. Slowing to one film per annum following his award-winning 2004, in the next four years he produced <The Bow> (2005), <Time> (2006), <Breath> (2007) and <Dream> (2008). In 2008, he also ventured into producing, handing his own scripts to some of his former assistant directors for <Beautiful> and the smash hit gangster/cinema mashup <Rough Cut>, by JANG Hoon. But when an on set accident almost ended in tragedy on <Dream>, the director was so shaken up that he went into retirement.

Casting out his demons with the self-filmed autobiographical work <Arirang>, KIM returned in 2011 and picked up the Un Certain Regard prize at the Cannes Film Festival. That same year he released <Amen>, which he filmed himself with only one actress during a few days in Europe. Despite a debut at the San Sebastian Film Festival, KIM pulled the film from theaters shortly after its debut and has not allowed it to be screened since. <Poongsan>, which he wrote and produced, came out the same year. KIM’s greatest victory came in 2012, when his austere film <Pieta> earned him the Golden Lion from Venice, making him the first Korean filmmaker to take the top award in either Cannes, Berlin or Venice. Though neither earned awards, his next two works also debuted at Venice, 2013’s controversial castration drama <Moebius> and 2014’s revenge thriller <One on One>, his 20th work as a director. In 2013, the prolific filmmaker also wrote and produced three films, <Rough Play>, <Godsend> and <Red Family>, while <Made in China> debuted in 2014.

In 2015, he made the small-scale indie drama <Stop> in Japan. The film, which concerned the Fukushima Disaster, bowed at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Maintaining his pace, KIM prepared another film in 2016, this time teaming up with RYOO Seung-bum.
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