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Kwon joined Cho Seungwoo and Shin Mina on the list ‘New Actors – 7 Rising Stars that will Brighten Up Korean Cinema’ which was compiled to commemorate the 7th anniversary of Cine21. The 7 things he listed as his favorite can let you have a better idea of what the 26-year-old was like: "Jung Woosung, Kim Sungjae (singer and rapper), my mother, the car I don’t own yet, the sea, movies, drawings." 

By the time he was filming Cho Uiseok's debut film Make It Big (2002), Kwon had grown so comfortable on set that he couldn't tell anymore whether he was working or just having fun. That was because Song Seungheon, who played Seonghwan, was the same age and they had first met when he was working as a model, and Kim Yeongjun, who played Jinwon, was also a close friend from that time. In the movie, Kwon, who plays Wuseob, who is “pure, very friendly, with a gravity of his own”, works with two friends to secure a bag containing 2.1 billion won. Without him even realizing it, playing the serious Song Hakrim in Volcano High might have taken a toll on his bright and light personality; it was back to full swing and he could be seen smiling again with Make It Big. 

Ahead of the release of My Tutor Friend, Kwon and his co-star Kim Haneul made the cover of the 388th issue of Cine21. His character is Kim Jihun, a 20-year-old high school student who is receiving private lessons from a woman of the same age, Choi Suwan (Kim Haneul). According to him, if until then he had only played students, that’s because he was looking younger than he was, but he was already drawing the line, saying that he would never wear a school uniform anymore, even for a joke. The reason he gave was that he wanted to “change his character into one that will surprise everyone because there are many things that I’m good at and I’m confident about”. His eyes were full of enthusiasm for his work when he said he wanted to become “an actor you can tell is awesome just by looking at him like Jung Woosung, who can guess the points that the audience will enjoy like Song Kangho, and who is good at acting like Sul Kyunggu.” 

Kwon may have bid farewell to the school uniform, but Yoo Ha’s Spirit Of Jeet Keun Do – Once Upon A Time In High School is the film that made him go back on his word. “I decided to wear it just once more because I liked the scenario”, he said as he took on the role of shy transfer student Hyeonsu, who builds a friendship with Woo-shik (Lee Jungjin), the strongest fighter in school, while experiencing the pain of unrequited love when he meets Eunju (Han Gain). Showing off a performance that makes full use of his body such as a nunchaku action scene, he could recal vividly the moment when he was immersed in emotions: “It was frustrating at first because my acting was buried deep inside, but at some point I felt like, ‘This is precisely what acting is all about. I hope that with this film people will say, ‘There is something to Kwon Sangwoo’.” 

The script for Love, So Divine (2006), which he performed with Ha Jiwon, Kwon was already carrying it around when he was filming My Tutor Friend. “I think there are a lot of things that are worth trying.” Having personally chosen this project, he actually made a lot of suggestions to the director, Huh Inmoo, while on set, and he also showed that he was keen to improvise. After taking so many physically demanding roles, in this movie he plays the role of a diligent seminary student, Gyushik. Kwon said, "If I knew it would be this easy, I wouldn’t have waited this long to play this kind of character." 

Tanned skin, unkempt beard, and disheveled hair; Kwon was literally unrecognizable when he walked onto the interrogation room set built in the Bundang Design Center for Running Wild (2006) in July 2005. Playing Jang Doyeong, a wild and aggressive detective in the homicide unit, he would not let go of Yoo Jitae, who plays the role of the prosecutor who is at odds with him, until the end of the take. Kwon, whose face was betraying that he was exhausted both physically and mentally from giving blows all day long, muttered, "I'd rather be the one who gets beaten." 

Kwon starred in Chinese Zodiac (2012), which was directed by Jackie Chan, and attended the 59th Cannes Film Festival as part of its promotion. “This film is important to me in that it is the result of my efforts to start a career in China”, he said. 

After years of participating in Chinese films and Korean series, The Accidental Detective is the title that brought Kwon back to Korean films for the first time in four years. He confessed the anxiety he felt during that time, saying, "I was uncomfortable and sad because it felt like I had left the industry." In his comeback work, Kang Daeman, a comic book store owner who also runs an online community that specializes in unsolved murders, teama up with Sung Dongil, who plays Detective Roh Taesu from the Metropolitan Police Department, to investigate a murder case. “I’m nervous because it’s the first time I’m being portrayed as your man next door, but isn’t it time for me to show my normal self without pretension? At this rate, even going back to the kind of roles that people find cool is on the table. If you are an actor, it’s possible.”