Joint Security Area
| Joint Security Area | |
| Title (English) | Joint Security Area |
|---|---|
| Title (Korean) | 공동경비구역 JSA |
목차
Plot
Joint Security Area takes the procedural route as Jean tries to piece together the “why” behind a fatal shooting at a North Korean border house that left two North Korean officers, Private Jeong Woo-jin (Shin Ha-kyun) and Choi (Kim Myoeng-su), dead, and two other soldiers, North Korean Sergeant Oh Kyeong-pil (Song Kang-ho) and South Korean Sergeant Lee Soo-hyuk (Lee Byung-hun), wounded. According to Kyeong-pil, Soo-hyuk stormed their outpost singlehandedly and shot all three before retreating. According to Soo-hyuk, those dastardly North Koreans nicked him while he was pinching a loaf in the woods, and he escaped their clutches with guns blazing. Jean, of course, doesn’t buy what they’re selling, in part because the math doesn’t add up, in part because South Korean Private Nam Sung-shik (Kim Tae-woo) self-defenestrates under questioning, and in part because when Soo-hyuk and Kyeong-pil see each other on neutral ground, they react in big, emotional ways unexpected from even bitter enemies. The alibis don’t wash. [1]
Cast
Lee Young-ae as Maj. Sophie E. Jean Lee Byung-hun as Sgt. Lee Soo-hyuk (Korean: 이수혁) Song Kang-ho as Sgt. Oh Kyeong-pil (Korean: 오경필) Kim Tae-woo as Pvt. Nam Sung-sik (Korean: 남성식) Shin Ha-kyun as Pvt. Jung Woo-jin (Korean: 정우진) Christoph Hofrichter as Maj. Gen. Bruno Botta Herbert Ulrich as Capt. Persson.
Release and Reception
The film drew nearly half a million viewers in Seoul alone in its first week. Within 15 days of its release the film reached one million admissions and by early 2001 Joint Security Area had become the highest-grossing film in Korean film history.[3] It was later passed by the films Friend, Silmido and Taegukgi: The Brotherhood of War. Overall, JSA had 2,499,400 admissions in Seoul over its 20 weeks in the cinemas and an estimated 5.8 million admissions nationwide.[3] The film was also very successful in Japan where it grossed ¥1,160,000,000 becoming one of the top grossing foreign productions of 2001.[4]
A DVD of the movie was presented to North Korea's leader Kim Jong-il by South Korea's President Roh Moo-hyun during the Korean summit in October 2007.[5]
In 2009, director Quentin Tarantino named the film as one of his twenty favorite films since 1992.
Awards and Nominations
2000 Blue Dragon Film Awards[citation needed]
Best Film Best Director – Park Chan-wook Best Supporting Actor – Shin Ha-kyun Best Cinematography – Kim Seong-bok 2000 Busan Film Critics Awards
Best Actor – Lee Byung-hun, Song Kang-ho 2000 Director's Cut Awards
Best Director – Park Chan-wook Best Actor – Song Kang-ho Best New Actor – Shin Ha-kyun Best Producer – Shim Jae-myung 2001 Deauville Asian Film Festival[citation needed]
Lotus d'Or (Prix du Jury) ("Jury Prize") Lotus du Public (Prix du Public) ("Popular Choice") Lotus du Meilleur Acteur ("Best Actor") – Song Kang-ho 2001 Seattle International Film Festival[citation needed]
New Director's Showcase Special Jury Prize 2001 Berlin International Film Festival[7]
Nomination – Golden Berlin Bear 2001 Baeksang Arts Awards[8]
Best Director – Park Chan-wook 2001 Grand Bell Awards[citation needed]
Best Film Best Actor – Song Kang-ho Best Sound – Kim Seok-weon, Kim Won-yong Best Art Direction Nomination – Best Supporting Actor – Shin Ha-kyun 2001 Fantasia Festival[citation needed]
Nomination – Best Film 2002 Blue Ribbon Awards[citation needed]
Best Foreign Language Film 2003 Hong Kong Film Awards[citation needed]
Nomination – Best Asian Film
Academic Analysis
Every aspect of the Korean society praised “JSA,” except for one: the Army. The majority of its members mocked the film as utterly unrealistic, based on an event that could have never happened in real life. Furthermore, in an extreme incident that occurred on September 26th, 2000. Twenty old members of theJSAunion of veterans stormed into the offices of the production company, Myung Film, breaking windows and threatening the employees. They demanded that the company should offer its apologies to the army, and to include a note at the beginning and at the end of the film that would state that the events occurring in the movie are purely fictional. Despite protests from the majority of the industry, the company eventually concurred.
Bibliography
Kim, Kyung-hyun (2004). "9. 'Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves': Transgressive Agents, National Security, and Blockbuster Aesthetics in Shiri and Joint Security Area". The Remasculinization of Korean Cinema. Durham and London: Duke University Press. pp. 259–276. ISBN 0-8223-3267-1.
References
Joint Security Area Movie Review by Anthony Leong from MediaCircus.net Before There Was Vengeance, There Was Joint Security Area - Paste (pastemagazine.com) Film Review: J.S.A.: Joint Security Area (2000) by Park Chan-wook (asianmoviepulse.com) Joint Security Area - Wikipedia Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission - Wikipedia
