3 Reasons why the South Korean director — Bong Joon-Ho is so successful.
No South Korean director ever achieved the honor of winning the American Academy award, until the ‘host director’ Bong Joon-Ho released his, now worldwide famous movie, Parasite.
With Bong Joon-Ho’s movie Parasite, Bong Joon-Ho was the first to win the American academy award as a South Korean. He Not only won the Academy award, but Bong Joon-Ho also the Asian Film Awards, the Asia Pacific Screen Awards, and many more. He was the remarkable first South Korean Director to win the American Academy Award, and his success in the American movie industry is much more meaningful than just the success of an individual in the American academy awards which lacks diversity. Being a minority in the American movie industry, he went through obstacles and he has countless reasons for his success. So, How did Bong Joon-Ho start as an unrecognized Rookie Director to an Academy-worthy director?
Bong Joon-ho’s persistence and competence.
Bong Joon-ho’s persistence and competence can’t be compared to any other. Starting from a low-paid side director, with his persistence and competence he was able to grow as an oscar-worthy director. In Bong Joon-Ho’s earlier days, he often struggled financially, not getting paid enough. In one interview, Bong Joon-Ho mentions his earlier days’ struggle with money.
“Directing the movie ‘Motel Cactus’ for a year and 10 months, The money I received during that period was 4.2 million won (4200 dollars).” (Bong Joon-Ho)
Even going through the hard days as an unknown director, he endured the time of struggle, waiting for the day that he will succeed as a filmmaker. Finally, with his second movie, Memories of Murder, Bong Joon-Ho started getting recognition for his great work. Memories of Murder, which brought great success for Bong Joon-Ho’s career was based on a real murder case in Hwasung, South Korea. More than 5.25 million watched the movie just in South Korea.
This movie’s success seemed like it was finally the end of Bong Joon-Ho’s hardships; however, there were much more difficulties Bong Joon-Ho encountered after.
Being a rookie director with the success of his movie, great expectations and pressure were on Bong Joon-ho. Bong Joon-Ho was extremely pressured to make a good movie. With great expectations on him with his later movie, The Host, Bong Joon-Ho himself was pushed to make the best movie. At the time of the creation of this movie, 2006, monster/creature movies in South Korea were very rare and weren’t seeking popularity. It was an adventure for Bong Joon-Ho to make monster/creature movies in South Korea was at the bottom of popularity. Despite its popularity, it was a struggle just to make the movie. This movie required work for CG ( computer-generated), which at that time were rarely used and very undeveloped. Bong Joon-Ho decided to work with Weta Digital, famous for the movie The Lord of the Rings. However, things didn’t work out as smoothly.
(the negotiation with Weta digital got canceled.) ”When the negotiation with Weta digital was canceled because of the budget, I nearly killed myself. During the time, I had lots of thoughts to commit suicide,” (Bong Joon-Ho.)
The plan to work with Weta digital getting changed brought great hardship to Bong Joon-Ho. Bong Joon-Ho spent hours studying CGs, stating that “nothing changes if nothing is done.” He also mentioned that he felt like a liar himself since the movie’s release date was already announced, but his plans got canceled.
After spending months creating this movie, The Host is now known as one of the best, and one of the remarkable creature movies made in South Korea.
The amount of work Bong Joon-Ho dedicates to movie creation is truly admirable, and it explains how he was able to be a successful movie director.
His movie isn’t just a movie.
Bong Joon-Ho’s movies are more than just a movie. His movies contain messages and depths to them. He gives his movies more depth by giving memorable visuals connect to the big ideas Bong Joon-Ho tries to give off to viewers. Bong Joon-Ho’s newest movie, Parasite, very clearly illustrates these two characteristics. In one scene in Parasite, where Ki-Jung is smoking on top of a flooding toilet, the colors and the way the water is splashing give an extreme impact to viewers. The use of depressing colors and the visual of just seeing Ki-Jung smoking on top of a toilet (flooding out black-colored water) gives a clear impact to viewers. Not only does it give a bold image for viewers, but this also shows and this vivid scene connects to the lethargy of man when it comes to an inescapable situation. Like this, Bong Joon-Ho uses bold visuals to impactfully give a message to viewers.
Similar to this scene, Parasite contains a lot of bold scenes: Moon-Gwang knocking on the door with extreme rain, Geun-se in the cellar knocking on the sensor light, and the last scene, the murder scene, which each of them contain a bold message as well.
Parasite’s main theme illustrates the conflict between the distance between two classes (rich and poor). So, Bong Joon-Ho uses lines between the two classes to show that they’re different and distanced. Bong Joon-Ho shows an actual line between two classes with his visuals. There are some main scenes that clearly shows this technique:
Like this, Bong Joon-Ho gives viewers an unforgettable experience with bold visuals and meanings of the story.
Bong Joon-Ho’s Personality
Bong Joon-Ho’s personality is one of the 3 reasons why Bong Joon-Ho was so successful. With his one nickname, ‘The Host’ director, ( ‘the host’ was compared to how Bong Joon-Ho’s directing skills exceed the human level, as it is the name of one of his movies) he also has another nickname; Bongtail.
Bongtail is the combination of Bong Joon’s Ho’s surname (Bong) and the word ‘detail.’ Bong Joon-Ho’s personality is very meticulous, and in his storyboard, that feature of him is very well shown. The picture below is a storyboard for Parasite. His storyboard is extremely detailed (has the camera angles, dialogues, and the exact movement of the actors), and Bong Joon-Ho has drawn all the scenes in the movie, in a very detailed way.
Many around director Bong Joon-Ho proves he’s such a meticulous person, it shows how dominant he is in the details of the movie and the visuals. His personality of being meticulous is a dominant trait as a director, which makes his movie’s every single scene so detailed and good.
[Tilda Swinton / Starring in “Snowpiercer”]
(Do you know director Bong Joon-ho’s nickname?) “Bong Tail. Yeah, I do. That’s a good nickname. He’s on it, he’s got all the detail .”
With his endless care and effort to make a masterpiece movie, Bong Joon-Ho’s personality is an important part of his success.
Today, with the growing movie industry, Bong Joon-Ho has succeeded to grow as a proud South Korean Movie director who is internationally famous. His success in America is far more meaningful, as now the problem with lack of diversity in the oscar award is in the spotlight. Unlike the earlier days in which the awards were only focused on White men, there seems to be a start of diversity in the Oscars as with South Korean director Bong Joon-Ho’s success. Succeeding in the American movie industry full of unfairness required hard work and pain through the process. Bong Joon-Ho starting from an unrecognized director. However, Bong Joon-Ho’s dedication to his movie has now led to the result for his place right now. With the success of a dedicating South Korean director, this can be the sparkle of difference in the set-in-stone American movie awards.