Im Kwon-taek: Run Far, Fly High
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19 October 2012 - 2 November 2012
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Im Kwon-taek, winner of the Best Director prize at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival, as well as the Berlin Bear Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2005 Berlin Film Festival, came from a humble film background as a prop assistant to a lighting assistant. Yet since 1962 he has directed more than 100 films in his native South Korea. Critics contend that after his early films of the 60s and 70s - mainly historical dramas and war movies - Im found his true artistic voice in the 1980s and onward, through his subtly subversive manner of portraying South Korea's urgent and pressing social issues during a time when the country's film industry was highly censored. Critic Tony Rayns writes that the true pleasure which one experiences watching Im's films is found in their "rounded characters, humour and unsentimental pathos". The ICA is delighted to screen seven of Im Kwon-taek's films, as well as host a special Q&A with the director after the screening of his 2000 work, "Chunhyang".
The film season is being run in collaboration with the BFI Southbank, which is screening 15 more of Im Kwon-taek's films. For more information and to book tickets, please visit the BFI's event page.
2 November 2012
A Low Life offers a gritty look at the interplay of violence and protest echoing political unrest during the transitory time between the end of Rhee Syng-man's rule and democratic elections in Seoul in the second half of twentieth-century.
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31 October 2012
Hanji, the name for traditional handmade Korean paper, unites the two storylines in one of Im Kwon-taek's most well-known features.
Im Kwon-taek: "Chunhyang" + Q&A
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27 October 2012
Based on the Pansori folk song of the same title, Chunhyang tells the tale of two-star crossed lovers, Mongryong, the son of a nobleman, and Chungyang, the daughter of a retired kisaeng.
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26 October 2012
In between love and despair, four women face jealousy and mental breakdown at the hands of the men who claim to love them.
Im Kwon-taek: "The General's Son"
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21 October 2012
The General's Son follows the course of Kim Doo-han's rise through the Korean street gangs which, through unconventional means, protect the same streets Doo-han's father once fought to protect.
Im Kwon-taek: "Festival - 1996"
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20 October 2012
"Festival - 1996" is both rich in its poignant wisdom in the face of death and in the melancholy which so often accompanies family reunion.
Im Kwon-taek: "Village of Haze"
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19 October 2012
When Kkae-cheol and So-ok's paths meet, two unwanted souls find solace in this portrait of unconventional lust.
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