KANG Woo-suk is one of the rare breed of directors that came onto the Korean movie scene in the 1980s who has not lost their box office power through the 2000s. In particular, seven of his films that hit the screen in the 2000s, starting with <Public Enemy>(2002), were all blockbusters each with at least 3 million viewers in Korea. Kang is highly adept at both action and comedy, the local audience’s favorite genres. <Public Enemy>, whose protagonist is a somewh...More

KANG Woo-suk is one of the rare breed of directors that came onto the Korean movie scene in the 1980s who has not lost their box office power through the 2000s. In particular, seven of his films that hit the screen in the 2000s, starting with <Public Enemy>(2002), were all blockbusters each with at least 3 million viewers in Korea. Kang is highly adept at both action and comedy, the local audience’s favorite genres. <Public Enemy>, whose protagonist is a somewhat corrupt and mildly righteous detective named Kang Chul-joong, was so popular as to spawn not only a sequel but a threequel. The director made numerous outstanding films in collaboration with some of the most popular actors of the past few decades, including [AHN Sung-ki], [PARK Joong-hoon], [SUL Kyoung-gu], and [JUNG Jae-young]. <Silmido>(2003) was the first Korean movie that ushered in an era of 10 million audiences.
As a producer, KANG symbolizes the age of Chungmooro, the mecca of Korean movies, before Korea’s filmmaking industry was engulfed by corporate interests and their big money. After having established himself as a director of many box office hits films, he expanded his production studio, [KANG Woo-suk Production] that was set up in 1993 and renamed as [Cinema Service] in 1995, and went into distribution business as well and contributed to the success of <Green Fish>, <NO. 3> and the likes. In the years subsequent to the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s (a.k.a., IMF years), he laid his hand on an increasingly more number of movies for production and distribution and along the way reshaped Korea’s cinema landscape. For the first time for a production house that represented the filmmaking industry, not corporate interests, [Cinema Service] engaged itself in aggressive M&A deals and experimented with different types of advanced business techniques such as equity investment. He also established an ad agency [Art Service], a film set [Art Service Studio], a theater chain [Primus Cinema] and other businesses, with an intention of building a vertically integrated comprehensive studio that encompasses all the areas of the filmmaking industry, from production to distribution.
His ambition was somewhat subdued amid the financial crisis of the mid-2000s, but KANG still is active in investing in and producing films. Having participated in producing a diverse array of movies, ranging from the auteurist <Chihwaseon> and <Chunhyang> of [IM Kwon-taek] and art films such as <Blossom Again> to commercial flicks such as <The Divine Weapon>, KANG is among the senior-level filmmaker who still has a firm grip on the industry.
In recent years, KANG has remained active as both a director and producer. He released the third installment of his Public Enemy franchise in 2008 and was a presence during 2010’s end of year awards for his mystery thriller Moss. KANG also produced Castaway on the Moon (2008), one of the most successful Korean films on the festival circuit during the late naughts. In 2013, KANG made the MMA-drama Fists of Legend and then set his next project as Two Policemen, a period version of his popular 90s franchise Two Cops.Less