YIM Soon-rye tells of women’s lives and marginalized lives in a plain format and calm narrative. She recently took a leadership position at an animal protection group, which shows she practices what she believes in. Her short film <Promenade in the Rain> received critical acclaim before her feature debut with <Three Friends>(1996). Her sympathy for those who are marginalized to the fringe of society continued to show in her films with <The Waikiki Brothers&g...More

YIM Soon-rye tells of women’s lives and marginalized lives in a plain format and calm narrative. She recently took a leadership position at an animal protection group, which shows she practices what she believes in. Her short film <Promenade in the Rain> received critical acclaim before her feature debut with <Three Friends>(1996). Her sympathy for those who are marginalized to the fringe of society continued to show in her films with <The Waikiki Brothers>(2001), a drama about a third-rate nightclub band that travels from one small town to another for a gig. <Forever the Moment>(2008), based on the true story of the 2004 Korean women’s national handball team that won the silver medal at the Athens Olympics, was a box office success that sold four million tickets in Korea. The movie’s cast of popular actors, comic script, and tear-inducing moments so seem like a transition from old YIM Soon-rye movies, but the fact that <Forever the Moment> also depicts Korean women who suffer from men’s discriminatory treatment puts the movie on the same line as YIM’s past works. Her latest film is a melodrama with Buddhist overtones, titled, <Rolling Home with a Bull>(2010). YIM served as executive producer on 2011’s Romance Joe and also contributed a short to the omnibus Sorry, Thank You that same year, before returning to the director’s chair. Her next film was the family comedy South Bound, starring KIM Yun-seok, which was released in theaters in early 2013. Towards the end of the following year, she released <The Whistleblower>, a more accomplished (and successful) return to politically conscious filmmaking. Though fictionalized, the film largely takes after the story of the fraudulent stem cell scientist HWANG Woo-suk. Featuring PARK Hae-il, YOO Yeon-seok and LEE Gyoung-young, the film was a solid earner in theaters.Less