Five Korean Films Air At 76th Cannes International Film Festival

Five Korean films were invited to this year’s Cannes International Film Festival, including projects by veteran directors and directors making their debut. The films are Kim Chang-hoon’s Hopeless, Kim Jee-woon’s Cobweb, Hong Sang-soo’s In Our Day, Kim Tae-gon’s Project Silence and Jason Yu’s Sleep. None of the films were selected to compete for the Palme d’Or. Hopeless and Cobweb were invited in the Un Certain Regard and Out of Competition categories

Cobweb is a noir comedy about a film director, obsessed with re-shooting the end of his completed film Cobweb. He calls the cast and crew back to re-film, creating all kinds of chaos. Not only must he deal with the actors, who don’t understand his new ending, but he must cope with interference from censors.

The comedy, set in the 70s, is directed by Kim Jee-woon and stars Song Kang-ho. It’s the fifth time Kim and Song have worked together. Song starred in Kim’s The Good, The Bad and The Weird, The Age of Shadows, The Quiet Family and The Foul King. In Cobweb Song plays the obsessed director, while Im Soo-jung plays a veteran actress and Oh Jung-se plays her playboy actor husband. Jeon Yeo-been is the financial director of the film’s production company and f(x)’s Krystal Jung a rising star. Kim also directed the films I Saw The Devil and Bittersweet Life, as well as Apple TV’s first Korean language series Dr. Brain, starring Lee Sun-kyun.

Hopeless is director Kim Chang-hoon’s directorial debut. The film will be screened in the Un Certain Regard section, which focuses on art house films. Hopeless stars Song Joong-ki as a mobster who rescues a teen, played by Hong Sa-bin, from the hellish reality of his violent neighborhood.

Hong Sang-soo’s In Our Day will be the closing film for the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight section, a non-competitive section that introduces works by filmmakers who “profoundly influenced contemporary cinema and contributed to the evolution of its language.” In Our Day, starring Kim Min-hee, Ki Joo-bong and Song Seon-mi, is Hong’s 12th film at the festival. Hong made his directorial debut with The Day a Pig Fell and Woman is the Future of Man was his first film to screen in competition at the Cannes Film Festival. He received the Prix Un Certain Regard at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival for his film Hahaha.

Jason Yu’s horror film Sleep was invited for Cannes Critics’ Week, which focuses on emerging directors. In Sleep a pregnant wife starts to worry about her husband’s sleeping habits, which quickly turn bizarre. To resolve the problem they consult a sleep clinic and a shaman. The film stars Lee Sun-kyun and Jung Yu-mi. Jason Yu is a former assistant to director Bong Joon-ho.

Lee Sun-kyun also appears in Kim Tae-gon’s Project Silence, along with Ju Ji-hoon. The story follows people struggling to survive a series of crashes that shut down an Incheon bridge clouded with thick fog. As if that situation was not bad enough, things get much worse for the film’s protagonists when mutated military dogs escape their transport vehicle and start preying on humans. In the film Lee plays Cha Jung-won, a man traveling with his daughter. After the bridge closes down, Jung-won and the other survivors must figure out a way to make it through the night and unravel the mystery of the mutated dogs. Ju plays Joe Park, a brash tow truck driver with some expertise in disabled cars. Project Silence was invited to the Midnight Screening section, an out-of-competition section.

Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda screened his new film Monster at the festival. Kore-eda directed the Korean film Broker, starring IU, Song Kang-ho, Bae Doona and Gang Dong-won, which was screened at last year’s Cannes Festival.