Korean star Moon So-ri ‘curious’ about Vietnamese cinema

The Busan-born actress is best known for her role in the 2002 South Korean film Oasis, in which she played a woman with severe cerebral palsy who became involved in a difficult romance with an intellectually challenged man.

Her performance in Oasis earned Moon So-ri a Marcello Mastroianni Award for Emerging Actress at the Venice International Film Festival the same year. She was recently a member of the jury for the Orizzonti awards at the festival’s 73rd edition in September.

The Korean star arrived in central Vietnam on November 14 to attend the cinema event 'Autumn Meeting' held in both Da Nang City and neighboring Hoi An.

First held in 2013, Autumn Meeting is an annual cinema event co-founded by a group of young Vietnamese filmmakers looking to organize a meeting where new generations of talent can learn from their predecessors.

In November 14 ’s interview with Tuoi Tre, not long after arriving in Da Nang, Moon opened up about her personal experience with the Vietnamese film industry and how she had learnt about the cinema event which she had arrived for.

Moon said that a brief chat in September with Vietnamese director Phan Dang Di, one of the co-founders of Autumn Meeting, who had attended one of her lectures at Konkuk University in Seoul, had intrigued her so much that she had jumped at his invitation to attend the event as a guest lecturer.

Moon even suggested bringing along two of her students.

According to the 42-year-old star, the film industries of South Korea, Japan and China are the most developed in Asia, but at the same time are struggling to find room for new, original stories as they become more commercialized and formulaic.

Moon said that while attending international film festivals, many film curators had praised Vietnamese entries as being full of energy and distinctive in their own style, some even predicting that Vietnam could become an ‘X-factor’ in Asian cinema.

This appreciation for Vietnamese movies had made Moon ‘curious’ about the country’s film industry and driven her to attend this year’s Autumn Meeting in Da Nang.

Her first experience with a Vietnamese-language movie was the 1995 film Cyclo by director Tran Anh Hung, which won the Golden Lion at the 52nd Venice International Film Festival.

Moon has also seen Phan Dang Di’s films Bi, Don’t Be Afraid! and Big Father, Small Father and Other Stories prior to her arrival in Vietnam.

During the event, the star was a guest lecturer for an acting class alongside Lyndia Park, a seasoned acting coach, also from the Republic of Korea.