Kim Ho-sun (; born 9 March 1941) is a South Korean
film director
A film director controls a film's artistic and dramatic aspects and visualizes the screenplay (or script) while guiding the film crew and actors in the fulfilment of that vision. The director has a key role in choosing the cast members, p ...
,
producer, and
screenwriter who has enjoyed both critical and box office success.
Biography
Kim Ho-sun was born 9 March 1941 in
South Hamgyong Province
South Hamgyong Province (, ''Hamgyŏngnamdo''; ) is a province of North Korea. The province was formed in 1896 from the southern half of the former Hamgyong Province, remained a province of Korea until 1945, then became a province of North Kor ...
, now part of
North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu River, Y ...
. He dropped out of
Kyung Hee University
Kyung Hee University (abbreviated to KHU) (Hangul: 경희대학교; Hanja: 慶熙大學校) is a private research university in South Korea with campuses in Seoul and Suwon. Founded in 1949, it is widely regarded as one of the best universities ...
and made his directorial debut in 1974 with ''Hwannyeo''.
A member of the so-called "Visual Age" of Korean directors, Kim made some of the bestselling Korean films of the 1970s. The
local Korean cinema industry in the 1970s had to face the challenges of foreign imports, increased television ownership, and the stifling censorship of the military dictatorship of
Park Chung-hee.
Kim began his directing career making what are known as "hostess films," one of the few genres that the censors allowed some latitude to, these were melodramas that portrayed the lives of
bargirls and their milieu. Kim showed that despite the formulaic restrictions the censors placed on filmmaking, locally made films could still be individual and sell well, and in doing so inspired his fellow filmmakers. In terms of tickets sold, ''
Winter Woman'' that he directed in 1977 was the bestselling domestic film of the 1970s,
and would hold the record until ''
General's Son
''General's Son'' () is a 1990 South Korean crime film directed by Im Kwon-taek. It stars Park Sang-min as Kim Du-han, a gangster who discovers that he is the son of General Kim Jwa-jin. The film is the first in a trilogy, followed by ''General' ...
'' in 1990.