“Parasite” Director Bong Joon Ho Shares How He Started as a Director
This 10th of February as a tribute of "Parasite" bringing home four awards at the 92nd Academy Awards, the MBC broadcasted again a special episode featuring director Bong Joon Ho, where he shared his story about his beginnings as a director.
He shared; he saw a lot of foreign films that aired on television. And he can't get enough of them. Then on Friday nights, the American military channel broadcasted more erotic or violent films. And on the weekends he watched all the classics. He also explained that he wanted to learn a lot more about movies so he studied a lot. He would watch the same movie tens of times just to study it.
Director Bong Joon Ho shared that when he was in school joining the movie club, he sold donuts at the school store for six months so he could afford to buy a camera. He said that he remembered holding that camera while I slept.
Bong Joon Ho created the film "White Man" way back in the year 51994; the director said that during that time has no e5xperience yet so no actors knew who he was. One of his friends joined a company named called Yeon Woo Stage. Through that friend he was introduced to the actor named Kim Roe Ha. Bong Joon Ho recalled that for the appearance fee of actor Kim Roe Ha all that he can offer was a gift card for a button-up shirt. The actor Actor Kim Roe Ha, who also appeared as a guest on the MBC special replied that it was correct and he bought a shirt with the gift card.
When Bong Joon Ho entered the Korean Academy of Film Arts he submitted a short film titled "Incoherence" as his graduation project. Then Director Park Chan Wook who saw the graduation project. He then said that he first found out about director Bong Joon Ho through his graduation film called 'Incoherence,' which illustrate the hypocrisy of society's leadership. It was so fresh, off-the-wall, and creative, and it surprised Director Park Chan Wook. Director Park Chan also added that he had never seen such an amazing short film from Korea before.
Bong Joon Ho then became an assistant director for the film "Motel Cactus" and eventually released his first commercial film "Barking Dogs Never Bite", but it didn't do well in the box office. But his breakthrough came in the year 2003 with the film "Memories of Murder," gaining over 5 million moviegoers. He reminisced that he got married in the year 1995 and from then on until the year 2003 where he made the film 'Memories of Murder' he was experiencing difficulty. It was so bad that a college classmate would just give him rice.
The director was also questioned if he ever thought about giving up film-making, he responded that nearing the end, he was close to giving up. He remembers that it was way back in the year 1998 when he had a conversation with his wife he said to just give him a time frame of one year since he still have some savings that will do for just one year.
Director Bong Joon Ho continued his passion and filmed the hit movies "The Host" (2003), "Mother" (2009), "Snowpiercer" (2013), "Okja" (2017) and now "Parasite," which made history at the 92nd Academy Awards as the first non-English language film to win Best Picture and the first Korean film to ever win an Academy Award.
Congratulations to Director Bong Joon Ho!
