KOREAN CINEMA: THE SUCCESSORS OF ARIRANG

BY LEE CHANG DONG*

A young Korean is led away from his village, bound by a rope pulled by a Japanese policeman. He used a sickle to beat the henchman of a sadistic landowner, who was terrorising the villagers, to death. This is how the ending of Na Un-gyu's film, Arirang, goes. Legend has it that when the film was released in 1926 during the Japanese occupation, its Korean spectators wept in cinemas and sang the folk song, “Arirang”, in chorus.

 
 

	Arirang, 1926	The Ownerless Ferryboat, 1932

This film, now generally considered to have marked the true start of Korean cinema, is highly representative of one of its main characteristics: it reflects the context and social reality of the time, while expressing the emotions and desires of its audience. In The Ownerless Ferryboat, another hero of the silent era, Lee Gyu-hwan, evoked the anger of a population suffering the atrocities of Japanese imperialism in this film about a boatman who kills a railway engineer. Subsequently, the first Korean talkie, Histoire de Chunhyang (1935), was an adaptation of a traditional story that also evoked contemporary suffering and sadness.

In the 1960s, following a period of mass destruction caused by the Korean war (1950-1953) that took place soon after the end of Japanese colonisation (1945), film directors like Shin Sang-ok, Yoo Hyon-mok, Kim Soo-yong, Kim Ki-young and Lee Man-hee brought about what came to be known as the “Renaissance” of Korean cinema. Their talent was demonstrated through a wide variety of styles ranging from art-house productions to mainstream films, all of which shared the common characteristics of reflecting social reality and speaking on behalf of the Korean people.

This artistic tradition, which could be described as “realist”, was put on hold in the 1970s because of the strict censorship imposed by the dictatorial regime that reigned during this period. Under the regime’s watchful eye and controlling hand, the only productions authorised were melodramas and action films that avoided specific local settings, or works of propaganda that served the sole function of meeting the quota required to enable foreign films to be imported. Korean cinema inevitably plunged into a deep depression that it struggled to recover from, which affected both the industry itself, as well as artistic quality.

The Dream directed by Bae Chang-ho, 1990
 

At the turn of the 1980s and then again towards the middle of that decade, Bae Chang-ho and Lee Jang-ho on the one hand, and Park Kwang-su and Jang Sun-woo on the other, used their own unique styles to capture reality on film once again and, in so doing, lifted national cinema out of its long-term lethargy. Joining them in their regeneration efforts, their older counterpart, Im Kwon-taek, produced a number of highly modern works which set him apart from his generation.
 
 

Chihwaseon, Im Kwon-Taek, Award for Best Director, 2002.

Kim Ki-duk	Bong Joon-ho	Hong Sang-soo	Park Chan-wook
Breath, In Competition 2007	Mother, Un Certain Regard 2009	HAHAHA, Un Certain Regard Award 2010	Thirst, Jury Prize 2009

A key characteristic of today’s Korean cinema is its diversity. That said, Korean directors have continued to speak on behalf of their fellow citizens and to express their emotions and desires, regardless of the distinct genres and techniques they employ. Singing the songs the audience wants to sing: this is the spiritual legacy they have received from the past and which drives them in their work.

Poetry directed by Lee Chang Dong.

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* Lee Chang Dong is a screenwriter and film director. He received the Award for Best Screenplay for Poetry, which was presented in Competition at Cannes in 2010.

The Festival de Cannes would like to thank all the writers for their free contributions.