Korea’s film market saw enviable growth in the early 2000s and especially in the 2010s when the local market share hit more than 50 percent and admissions to Korean films surpassed 100 million between 2012 and 2019. It’s an industry that like China, India and Japan has successfully competed against Hollywood often beating it at its own game producing content for local audiences. Titles like The Host (2006) and Train to Busan (2016) emulated some of what made Hollywood tentpoles so appealing through spectacle but did so in a manner that could entertain Korean viewers, which also, in turn, attracted overseas audiences as well.

The popularity of Korean content at home didn’t go unnoticed in Hollywood as Korea’s own studio system led by CJ ENM, Lotte Entertainment and Showbox was being developed in the late 1990s and early 2000s that in some respects mirrored Hollywood’s own studio system.  Furthermore, films like SHIRI (1999) (one of Samsung’s last films before it exited the industry owing to the IMF crisis), JSA (2000) and Silmido (2003) that would become the first film to sell over 10 million tickets were demonstrating how Korea’s industry was rapidly developing.

Internationally it was quickly making inroads. The rights for English-speaking territories for The Way Home (2002) was picked up by Paramount Pictures. Warner Bros. also secured the remake rights for Il Mare (2000) that was later turned into The Lake House (2006) starring Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves.

Meanwhile films by Korea’s auteurs were winning awards at festivals in Europe with Park Chan-wook’s Oldboy (2003) making history bringing home the Grand Prix from the Cannes Film Festival becoming the first Korean film to do so.  

As early as the early 2000s, Hollywood studios were also turning to Korea’s local market given how much of a box office draw Korean films were becoming. Their involvement, though, has sometimes been sporadic. Disney, for instance, entered the industry in the early 2000s but it wasn’t until the streaming era where it has been more heavily involved in the Korean content industry producing more than 30 shows in two years for Disney Plus.

This week we track the films that have seen Hollywood studios cooperating with Korean film companies often through distribution but also in many cases in financing as well. We begin with Humanist (2001) before turning to The Phone (2002), The Yellow Sea (2010), The Age of Shadows (2016) and Okja (2017).

Humanist (2001)

An early example of a Korean film being distributed by a Hollywood studio was the dark comedy Humanist (2001) that was produced by Korea’s production company Bear Entertainment (now defunct) released in May 2001. The local distribution was handled by Tristar Pictures that forms part of the Sony Group Cooperation. The US company also distributed two other Korean films: The Rhapsody (2001) that hit screens earlier the same year and the comedy Magic Police Galgali and Okdongja (2004).

Directed by Lee Moo-young, he teamed up again with Park Chan-wook (they co-wrote JSA together) with Park credited as a co-writer. It was produced by Syd Lim whose producing credits also include Park’s Oldboy (2003) and The Handmaiden (2016).

The story centers around the son (Ahn Jae-mo) of an affluent retired general who inadvertently kills a traffic cop after being caught for driving under the influence. The cop’s partner seeks to bribe him and with his father not giving him the cash, he attempts to take him hostage with the help of his two unusual friends.

Coming out at a time when directors were experimenting with genre (Bong Joon Ho with Barking Dogs Never Bite (2000), Kim Jee-woon with The Quiet Family (1998) and The Foul King (2000), it’s a title that was a product of its time with its striking eccentricity.

The Phone (2002)

Ahn Byeong-ki’s The Phone (2002) was significant because it was not only distributed by Disney’s former brand Buena Vista International, but it was also financed by it. The subsidiary had also distributed other Korean titles including Il Mare (2000) and Bungee Jumping Of Their Own (2001) signaling their entry point into the Korean film industry. This came as other US studios were also become active in the sector. Warner Bros. also co-distributed Jeong Jae-eun’s Take Care of My Cat (2001).

Phone stars Ha Ji-won as an investigative reporter who starts receiving threatening calls after a story she publishes and subsequently changes her number, but the calls continue.  As she begins to investigate what’s behind the phone calls, further strange events unfold involving a missing high school student and other deaths.

Featuring vengeful spirits, it exhibits much of what made Korean horror popular in the early 2000s with its scares in confined spaces and themes of revenge. It was released in other markets including the UK where it was placed under the “Asia Extreme” brand along with other K-horror titles such as Memento Mori (1999), A Tale of Two Sisters (2003).

Ahn’s subsequent feature Bunshinsaba, Ouija Board (2004) starring Kim Gyu-ri was also distributed by Buena Vista International.  The director, known for his horror films would later work in the Chinese film industry making the Bunshinsaba 2 (2012) remake and its two sequels as well as the comedy Scandal Maker (2016), also a remake – this time of Kang Hyoung-chul’s Scandal Makers (2008) that was produced by the Korean production company Toilet Pictures (also behind Phone).

The Yellow Sea (2010)

With the Korean film industry falling into a slump in the mid-to-late 2000s the Hollywood studios appeared to take a step back from the Korean film industry but when it began to recover in the early 2010s, they returned.

An early indication of this was Na Hong-jin’s The Yellow Sea (2010) that was distributed and co-produced by 20^th Century Fox (later acquired by Disney in 2019). The studio collaborated with Showbox and the Korean production company Popcorn Film. It received investment both from Korea and the US with 20^th Century Fox, Showbox and the local management company Imagine Asia (formerly Wellmade StarM) co-financing the 10 billion won budgeted feature.

The film set in both Korea and China centers on a Korean Chinese man played by Ha Jung-woo who is jobless and buried in debt. With his wife in Korea in search for work and having not heard from her, he is in a desperate state and is convinced by a crime boss (Kim Yoon-seok) to carry out an assassination. But he soon finds that he has been set up and is being chased by both the police and gangs.

Na’s skills as a deft filmmaker and his box office appeal were no doubt factors in not only the financing of The Yellow Sea but also The Wailing (2016), which Fox would fully finance. The latter would go on to sell more than 6.8 million tickets.

Fox also generated headlines in 2013 with the release of Cho Dong-ho’s Running Man (2013) starring Shin Ha-kyun, its first Korean-language film it would produce, distribute, and finance. Other titles it was similarly involved in included Im Sang-soo’s Intimate Strangers (2014) and Chung Yoon-chul’s period film Warriors of the Dawn (2017) but both failed to make an impact at the box office.

The Age of Shadows (2016)

Rather tellingly some of the most successful films financed by the US studios were by the auteurs – Kim Jee-woon’s The Age of Shadows (2016) released the same year as The Wailing would also prove to be popular pulling in 7.5 million spectators. Akin to Na’s film, it was produced and financed by a Hollywood studio, this time Warner Bros. Korea in collaboration with Kim’s own production company Dark Circle Pictures and Harbin Film.

While Warner Bros. had been involved in Korea’s film industry to some degree in the 2000s distributing local films – it also distributed Park Chan-ok’s Paju (2009) – The Age of Shadows was its first Korean-language production with others later following such as A Single Rider (2017), V.I.P. (2017), Champion (2017) and Kim’s Illang: The Wolf Brigade (2018). Ultimately, however, none of them including the more recent Josée (2020) could hit the box office heights of Kim’s film with the pandemic and streaming transforming the industry in the 2020s.

Kim’s acclaimed period espionage drama set during the 1920s sees a Korean police captain (Song Kang-ho) wrestling with his conscience when he is ordered by the Japanese colonial government to search and arrest members of the Korean Independence movement. Meanwhile, a leading figure in the resistance movement (Gong Yoo) is attempting to transport explosives from Shanghai to Seoul.

Reminiscent of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) with its focus on dialogue instead of spectacle – though it does feature some exemplary set-pieces – it portrayed the period in a layered and absorbing manner.

Okja (2017)

A hugely significant film in terms of international co-productions and collaborations was Bong Joon Ho’s Okja (2017) that came as a turning point for the global and Korean film industry. While Netflix operates in a different way compared to traditional Hollywood studios, its position in the contents industry producing films and shows for its subscribers has put Netflix in the driving seat in the current studio ecosystem. Other studios have subsequently developed their own streaming platforms like Disney +, Max (Warner Bros.)

When Okja premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and when it was released in theaters in Korea in 2017 it was met with waves of controversy surrounding its day-and-date release. Exhibitors in France were opposed to its inclusion in the Cannes Film competition, while the major cinema chains in Korea (CJ CGV, Lotte Cinema, Megabox) also objected on similar grounds citing a three-week window between its release online and in cinemas.

The film was barred from screening in Korea’s multiplexes and would generate over 300,000 admissions on just ten percent of the nation’s screens after it premiered at the Daehan Cinema (it closed in 2024) in Seoul’s Chungmuro street – the symbolic home of Korean cinema after production companies were located there between the 1950s and 1980s.

The combination of Netflix as a disrupter to the industry and Bong Joon Ho as a genre rule breaker was a compelling mix. Had the film been released in 2025, it is doubtful it would have caused the same reaction but underscoring how both Netflix and Bong understood where the industry was heading, it was indeed a gamechanger.

Netflix would become the leading streamer in Korea with the studios and broadcasters forced to adapt to the new environment and Bong himself was able to further increase his profile internationally following his other transnational project Snowpiercer (2013) putting him on course to make history with Parasite (2019).

Like Snowpiercer, Okja features an international cast with Tilda Swinton, Jake Gyllenhaal and Paul Dano playing leading roles. Ahn Seo-hyun also stars as a girl who develops a friendship with a genetically modified pig. It was produced by US production companies Plan B and Kate Street Picture Company, along with Lewis Pictures located in Seoul.

Written by Jason Bechervaise

Edited by kofic