Choi Min-sik is a South Korean actor.
He is best known for his critically acclaimed role in Oldboy.
Together with Song Kang-ho and Sol Kyung-gu, Choi is considered both domestically and on
the global scene as among the very top echelon of South Korean actors in terms of presence
and talent.
Early life and education Choi was born on April 27, 1962 in Seoul,
South Korea.
When he was in third grade, Choi was diagnosed with tuberculosis and told by his doctor that
there was nothing that could be done for him.
Refusing to give up, he has eventually restored his health through an extended stay in the
mountains.
Career Graduating with a degree in Theatre from Dongguk
University, Choi first made a name for himself on the stage before breaking into the film
world with roles in Park Jong-won's early films Kuro Arirang and the acclaimed Our Twisted
Hero.
In the mid-nineties he continued to act in theater productions as well as in several
TV dramas, including The Moon of Seoul with Han Suk-kyu.
1997 marked his return to motion pictures, with a role as a tough-talking police investigator
in Song Neung-han's No. 3.
After a turn in Kim Ji-woon's debut film The Quiet Family, Choi's breakthrough would come
in 1999, when he was cast in the record-breaking Shiri.
His portrayal of a North Korean agent garnered him much praise and a Best Actor award from
the 1999 domestic Grand Bell Awards.
After starring in a theater production of Hamlet in the spring of 1999, Choi took on
his first lead role as a husband who discovers his wife's infidelity in Happy End, and in
early 2001 starred as a third-rate gangster opposite Hong Kong actress Cecilia Cheung
in the cult melodrama Failan.
In 2002, Choi took on his most high-profile role yet in Im Kwon-taek's Chihwaseon, where
he played the famous nineteenth-century Korean painter Jang Seung-up.
The film won a Best Director prize at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival.
Two years later, Choi would be back at Cannes with Oldboy, Park Chan-wook's Grand Prix-winning
story of a man locked up for 15 years without knowing the reason why.
Choi's impassioned and cool acting in Oldboy caused his popularity in South Korea to soar,
and made his name known to many overseas viewers.
He continued displaying his versatility in 2004 and 2005, playing a trumpet player who
agrees to teach a school music class in Springtime, a down-and-out former boxer who struggles
to put his life back together in Ryoo Seung-wan's Crying Fist, and a child murderer in Sympathy
for Lady Vengeance, the last film in Park Chan-wook's revenge trilogy.
In 2005 he and Song Kang-ho were accused by director and Cinema Service head Kang Woo-suk
of upping guarantees for high-profile actors, though Kang later rescinded the statement
and apologized.
At various points during 2006, Choi demonstrated in Seoul and at the Cannes Film Festival against
the South Korean administration's decision to reduce the Screen Quotas from 146 to 73
days as part of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States.
As a sign of protest, Choi returned the prestigious Okgwan Order of Cultural Merit which had been
awarded to him, saying, "To halve the screen quota is tantamount to a death sentence for
Korean film.
This medal, once a symbol of pride, is now nothing more than a sign of disgrace, and
it is with a heavy heart that I must return it."
In the next four years, Choi went on a self-imposed exile from making films, begun in protest
over the screen quota but also partly due to the studios' reluctance to hire the outspoken
and politically active actor.
Instead he returned to his theater roots in the 2007 staging of The Pillowman, his first
play in seven years.
During the retrospective on Choi held at the 14th Lyon Asian Film Festival in November
2008, the actor was asked his reaction to the upcoming remake of Oldboy, and he admitted
to the French reporters present that he was upset at Hollywood for using what he described
as low-style pressure tactics on Asian and European filmmakers so they could remake foreign
movies in the United States.
Feeling a renewed passion for acting, Choi made his comeback in Jeon Soo-il's 2009 art
film Himalaya, Where the Wind Dwells, in which he was the only South Korean actor working
with locally cast Tibetan actors.
Though Kim Ji-woon's 2010 thriller I Saw the Devil drew criticism from some quarters for
its ultra-violent content, reviewers agreed that Choi's performance as a serial killer
was memorable.
He did voice acting for Leafie, A Hen into the Wild, which in 2011 became the highest
grossing South Korean animated film in history.
In his 2012 follow-up Nameless Gangster, Choi essayed another complex, layered antihero,
and the Yoon Jong-bin film was both a critical and box office hit.
Choi's next film was Park Hoon-jung's New World, a 2013 noir about an undercover cop
in the world of gangsters, which also became successful critically and commercially.
For his English-language debut, Choi appeared in Luc Besson's Lucy, in the role of a gangster
who kidnaps a girl and forces her to become a drug mule, but she inadvertently acquires
superhuman powers.
He then played Yi Sun-sin in the blockbuster period epic The Admiral: Roaring Currents
about the Battle of Myeongnyang, regarded as one of the admiral's most remarkable naval
victories.
Roaring Currents became the all-time most watched film in South Korean film history,
the first ever to reach 15 million admissions and the first local film to gross more than
US$100 million.
Filmography
Kuro Arirang That Which Falls Has Wings
Our Twisted Hero May Our Love Stay This Way
Sara is Guilty Mom, the Star, and the Sea Anemone
No. 3 The Quiet Family
Shiri Happy End
Failan Chi-hwa-seon
Oldboy Taegukgi - cameo appearance
Springtime Crying Fist
Sympathy for Lady Vengeance Himalaya, Where the Wind Dwells
I Saw the Devil Leafie, A Hen into the Wild
Nameless Gangster New World
In My End Is My Beginning - cameo appearance Lucy
The Admiral: Roaring Currents Television
Love and Separation Miss and Mister
Dad Is the Boss Their Embrace
The Fourth Republic Till We Meet Again
The Last Lover The Moon of Seoul
Ilwol The Burning River
Sons and Daughters The Beloved
Years of Ambition Theater
The Pillowman Leave When They're Applauding
Hamlet Taxi Driver
Equus Awards
2013 KOFRA Film Awards: Best Actor 2012 Blue Dragon Film Awards: Best Actor
2012 Asia Pacific Screen Awards: Best Actor 2012 Buil Film Awards: Best Actor
2010 Director's Cut Awards: Best Actor 2005 Fantasia Festival: Best Actor
2005 The Village Voice Annual Film Critics Poll: Best Performance, Rank #40
2004 Director's Cut Awards: Best Actor 2004 Asia Pacific Film Festival: Best Actor
2004 Max Movie Awards: Best Actor 2004 Korean Film Awards: Best Actor
2004 Chunsa Film Art Awards: Best Actor 2004 Grand Bell Awards: Best Actor
2004 Baeksang Arts Awards: Best Actor 2003 Golden Cinematography Awards: Best Actor
2003 Korean Association of Film Critics Awards: Best Actor
2003 Blue Dragon Film Awards: Best Actor 2001 Director's Cut Awards: Best Actor
2001 Korean Association of Film Critics Awards: Best Actor
2001 Blue Dragon Film Awards: Best Actor 2001 Pusan Film Critics Awards: Best Actor
2001 Deauville Asian Film Festival: Best Actor 2000 Asia Pacific Film Festival: Best Actor
1999 Director's Cut Awards: Best Actor 1999 Grand Bell Awards: Best Actor
1999 Baeksang Arts Awards: Best Actor 1998 Golden Cinematography Awards: Most Popular
Actor 1997 Seoul Theater Festival: Best Actor
1992 Asia Pacific Film Festival: Best Supporting Actor
1990 KBS Drama Awards: Best New Actor References
External links Choi Min-sik at C-JeS Entertainment
Choi Min-sik at HanCinema Choi Min-sik at the Korean Movie Database
Choi Min-sik at the Internet Movie Database Choi Min-sik at Korea Tourism Organization
Choi Min-sik Fan Club at Daum