- At the end of May 2019, the Cannes jury unanimously awarded the Palme d'Or to the film “Parasite” by Bong Joon-ho.
- On the night of February 9-10, 2020, the film won four Oscars: best film, best director, best original script and best international film.
- The South Korean director was revealed internationally with his second film, "Memories of Murder", released in 2004 in France.
- Bong Joon-ho has made the mixture of genres and his sense of satire his trademark.
EDIT February 10, 2020: This article was published in June 2019, on the occasion of the release in French theaters of Parasite . It was updated after its triumph at the Oscars 2020.
The jury of the last Cannes Film Festival presented South Korea with the first Palme d'Or in its history. It went into the hands of Bong Joon-ho who caused a sensation on the Croisette with Parasite , a film at the crossroads of thriller, comedy and drama. While the feature film won four Oscars, including that of the best film and the best director, on the night of February 9 to 10, 20 Minutes offers you a short catch-up session of the previous feature films of the one who is one of the most popular filmmakers in Korean cinema.
- "Memories of Murder"
Bong Joon-ho's first film, Barking Dogs , was released in 2000, but it was three years later, with his second feature, Memories of Murder , that he placed himself on the radar of international cinephilia. Inspired by a real news item, the violent murders of ten women who have never been elucidated, he follows the investigation of two opposite methods of police in rural South Korea in the mid-1980s.
Grand Prize 2004 of the Cognac Police Film Festival, this thriller, worked on by doubt, marks the spirits with its oppressive atmosphere barely counterbalanced by flashes of absurdity. Just look at it to realize that season 1 of True Detective did not invent anything.
- "The Host"
It was with The Host , selected for the Directors' Fortnight, that Bong Joon-ho made his first steps on the Croisette in 2006. In this science fiction film, a mysterious creature emerged from the depths that puts Seoul to fire and blood. This blockbuster-like author's work - it has recorded more than 13 million admissions to the Korean box office - metaphorically attacks the American military presence in South Korea. Even if the hotpot never takes precedence over entertainment, the filmmaker shows that he has things to say and that he likes satire.
- "Mother"
Bong Joon-ho finds the Cannes Film Festival with his next film, Mother , presented in Un certain regard in 2009. Or the story of a widow ready to do anything to clear her 28-year-old son, mentally retarded, accused of murder. The film is a portrait of a courageous but also overprotective mother who constantly oscillates between drama and thriller, between emotion and suspense. In the title role, Hye-ja Kim, does wonders.
- "Snowpiercer"
In 2013, Bong Jooh-ho returned to action and science fiction with the adaptation of Transperceneige , the graphic novel by the French Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette. This dystopia takes place in 2031, when the planet is only expanses of snow and ice.
The humans who survived the chaos glagla are gathered in a gigantic train which criss-crosses the world at high speed without ever stopping at the risk of leading humanity to its loss. With this camera, where it bangs and beats dry, Bong Joon-ho spins the metaphor - a little too obvious - of class relationships, a subject also at the heart of Parasite .
- "Okja"
It was in 2017, with Okja , that Bong Joon-ho found himself for the first time in the running for the Palme d'Or. His chances of winning the supreme award were run ahead of the controversy that fell on the film intended to be visible only on Netflix. An exclusivity that has creaked the teeth of many film professionals, screaming in heresy. The controversy relegated the background of the film to the background.
Okja is a moving tale about the friendship of a little girl and a species of transgenic sow - a too cute creature - doomed to the slaughterhouse. A way to approach the subject of animal suffering, to denounce capitalism and to intone an ecological verse. The charge could have been much more ferocious and had only a limited scope, the fact remains that Bong Joon-ho demonstrated that his cinema had lost nothing of its uniqueness and that it perfectly masters the mixture of genres. And he brings new proof with Parasite .
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