Filmmaker Brothers Assemble Bittersweet Homage to Seoul
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Park Chan-kyong (left) and Park Chan-wook
If a city is like food, what could Seoul taste like? To film director brothers Park Chan-wook and Chan-kyong, Seoul is bittersweet. Out of 11,852 video clips of Seoul, the brothers chose 154 cuts and edited them into a 65-minute film promoting the city.
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The Seoul Metropolitan Government called for video images of Seoul for 100 days from Aug. 20 to Nov. 25 last year, and 6,523 video clips were submitted by Koreans and 5,329 by foreigners.
The resulting montage the Park brothers edited and created was unveiled on YouTube last week.
Chan-wook (51) and Chan-kyong (49) were born and raised in the city. They put many facets of the Korean capital in the film -- its sweetness and bitterness together. "If you show people only the beautiful images of a big city, nobody will believe that is the whole story. Festivities and demonstrations happen at the same time, and that's Seoul", said Park Chan-wook.
What does Seoul mean to them? "It's fast and annoying. It's tiring but fun. Many European cities are boring", said the younger brother.
"If other places are deserts or barren fields, Seoul is a jungle. I stayed in another city for a long time for the first time while shooting 'Stoker', and it was then that I knew Seoul is really my hometown", said the older brother.
The two have worked together on a number of projects whenever they found time to do so, and their first short film together, "Night Fishing", won the Golden Bear for best short film at the 61st Berlin International Film Festival in 2011.
The promotional film for Seoul is their fifth collaborative work together. They say they have never had an argument or a falling out.
"Bitter, Sweet, Seoul"'s official website (http://www.seoulourmovie.com/en/) or at YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1X5N679noM).