Cannes 2022: Asian cinema is worth the wait

And in this year’s Palme d’Or contest, Kore-eda, the most respected and creative director of Japanese cinema today, is back in the race with a film. The new name is Broker.

The special thing is that the movie is set in Korea with a bright Korean cast and speaks Korean.

The return of two big names

In a film career spanning more than 3 decades, Kore-eda has always focused on exploiting stories about life and small, easily forgotten identities in Asian megacities.

His films are slow, heavily narrative, but always reveal hidden corners that make the audience dumbfounded.

Directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda

Once compared to Ozu – the legendary director of Japanese cinema, Kore-eda has devoted the cinema world to excellent works such as Still walking, Nobody knows, Life father like son and most recently Shoplifters – the film won the Palme d’Or about a family of thieves in Tokyo.

With Broker – this year’s Palme d’Or contest, Kore-eda continues to explore a social story: newborn babies are abandoned by their parents in boxes outside maternity hospitals in Seoul. .

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Broker scene

The main cast of the film includes Song Kang Hoo (this is the 7th time that a big Korean star has had a film to compete at Cannes), Gang Dong Won and Bae Doona (the actress who worked with Kore-eda in the movie). his previous Air doll films).

Kore-eda’s competitor for the Palme d’Or at Cannes this year is Park Chan Wook, also a big name in contemporary Korean cinema with shocking films.

Decision to leave – the work of director Park Chan Wook competes for the Palme d’Or at Cannes this year – Photo: MUBI

Nearly 20 years ago, Park Chan Wook once stunned Cannes with the movie Oldboy (2003) with violent revenge scenes.

That film brought Park the Grand prize – the second most important award at Cannes after the Palme d’Or.

In the years that followed, Park Chan Wook continued to bring to Cannes a number of other critically acclaimed works, most notably the film The Handmaiden (2017).

Park’s competition for the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes is Decision to leave – a Chinese-language mystery crime drama starring Chinese actress Tang Wei.

This “noir” crime drama, co-written and directed by Park himself, tells the story of a detective (played by Park Hae Il) who is investigating the death of a man who fell from a mountain top.

The wife of the ill-fated victim (Tang Duy) is the main suspect of the murder. However, during the investigation with many unanswered mysteries, the detective fell in love with the suspected widow.

The script idea doesn’t seem new and has appeared in a number of classic “noir thriller” works, but when it came through the hands of Park Chan Wook’s director, he must have brought it up. gives viewers many surprises, if not shocking.

And the unknowns are worth waiting for

In the past two decades, Korean cinema has replaced Japan and China as the “baby” at the world’s No. 1 prestigious Cannes Film Festival.

Not only always present in the category of competition for the Palme d’Or, Korean cinema also often appears in other competition categories or non-competition screenings to attract the world’s attention.

Hunt by Lee Jung Jae

Hunt – the first work that the actor turned to director Lee Jung Jae for the first time – will be shown in a screening at midnight.

The star actor is a globally known name after the groundbreaking TV series Squid Game released by Netflix last year.

But not only as an actor, Lee Jung Jae will prove his talent in the spy crime drama Hunt with other important creative positions such as writer, producer, director and the lead role, of course.

He plays a head of a South Korean intelligence unit tasked with tracking down a North Korean spy who is hiding in his ranks. Co-acting with Lee Jung Jae is Jung Woo Sung, also a prominent name in Korean cinema.

Competing for the award in the Critics’ Week category is “Next Sohee” by female director Jung July – who made her remarkable debut at Cannes a few years ago, “A girl at my door”.

Bae Doona in Next Sohee

In this year’s Cannes screening, Bae Doona (this is her second film in competition after Broker) plays a pressured female detective at work and her strange relationship with a coroner. high school girl.

The last Korean-language work to compete in the Un Certain Regard category is All the people I’ll never be by David Chou, an emerging filmmaker. of Cambodia.

In 2016, he had his debut film Diamond Island win an award at Critic’s Week in Cannes and last year he was the producer of the film White building that competed at the Venice Film Festival.

In this year’s Cannes competition film, David Chou tells the story of a young French-Korean girl who is returning to her birthplace to find her biological parents.

For many years now, Asian cinema plays an increasingly important role at the Cannes Film Festival and many other prestigious film festivals around the world. And this year is no exception, when the list of films competing for the main categories at the 75th Cannes Film Festival appears many names worth looking forward to.

Source: tuoitre.vn