Chung Doo Hong 정두홍 Jung Doo Hong

[rubie]

Smile dear Kseniya, for you and everyone... a thorough & very positive KBS write-up just on Mr. Jung.

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June 14, 2006

Chung Doo-hong, best martial arts movie director in Korea

One person is drawing extraordinary attention in the Korean movie industry these days. He is an indispensable figure in action films. The man in focus is director Chung Doo-hong, who is considered the best martial arts director in Korea.

Devotion and purity

Chung is widely regarded as the representative martial arts director for movies and is arguably the best stuntman in Korea. There are numerous episodes involving Chung. We can easily spend half a day listening to stories about him from movie directors who worked with him, including Kim Young-bin, Chang Hyun-soo and Kim Sung-soo. If we put together all the episodes about him derived from the production of movies and TV dramas, we could easily find enough stories to publish two volumes. Chung has always been highly determined and oftentimes excessively opinionated, and ready to cause a big stir. But everyone who has gotten accustomed to working with him wants to work with him again. The reason is simple. When the director of a movie wants to create any type of scene, Chung produces it no matter what. More often than not, directors who wished to produce a specific scene have to prevent Chung from taking on the challenges, rather than Chung refusing to do them, which attests to his devotion and enthusiasm.

When Chung is acting in a scene, or guiding other actors in their performances, his eyes look so passionate and determined that one might find them scary. But anyone who has seen him smile is immediately put off guard. In normal times, he is a friendly and seemingly naive soul -- just a simple man whom director Kim Sung-soo has nicknamed "peasant."

Taekwon Boy's dream

Chung was born in 1967 in Chilsan-ri, Imcheon-myeon, Buyeo-gun, South Chungcheong Province. In stark contrast to his image now, he was unusually introspective in personality until he entered high school. He had no interest in sports, and felt shy when he tried to perform something in front of girls. He was also small in size. But one incident changed his life dramatically: a private Taekwondo institute opened near his school.

He had always kept in his memory impressive and beautiful scenes from a Children's Taekwondo King Competition that he had watched on TV as a child. He soon became deeply engrossed in taekwondo, and would practice taekwondo at the institute everyday, rain or shine. He was able to do so in part because of his deep tenacity, which makes him to try his best at whatever he does until he completely masters it.

Because he was so poor, he could not even afford to pay his training fees. But the master of the institute, Lee Gak-soo, taught him taekwondo for free because he recognized Chung's faithfulness and talent in the traditional Korean martial art. This is how he entered the world of sports, which ended up becoming his lifetime career. He entered Junior College of Incheon as an athletic student. He was also selected as a member of a performing team that promoted taekwondo and Korean culture around the world, and spent much of his college years overseas. He served as a martial art trainer of a frontline elite unit during his compulsory military service, before briefly serving as a bodyguard for a parliamentarian after his discharge from the military.

One day, a friend on his bodyguard team who had worked as a stuntman recommended Chung become a stuntman. But this rosy dream soon faced a harsh reality. By 1990, the compensation and benefits stuntmen received were meager at best. Worse, he failed to get a role in a movie for which he had signed on to perform stunts. As a result, he would use his muscles and physical strength only to carry heavy equipment for his stunt acting team. Deeply disappointed, he stopped performing stunt work and began exercising alone. It was at that time that he went to Boramae Park in southern Seoul, a place which he continues to use as his home base. He would go to Boraemae Park every day, exercise there to improve his physical strength, and work on various martial arts at a nearby training center from 11 p.m. until dawn. Later, he moved to a hilly village in Boncheong-dong, which is closer to the park, and would climb up the hill repeatedly to intensify his exercises.

He continued to exercise for three months there, and eventually found a role substituting Kim Dong-hee's character played by actor Lee Il-jae in "the General's Son," a hit movie produced by director Lim Kwon-taek. He successfully performed his role in the work, capitalizing on the tireless efforts and suffering he had endured during the three-month period at Boramae Park, and deeply impressed producers and staff while shooting the movie.

Still, Chung thinks stuntmen are not being compensated adequately even these days, although he says their working conditions have improved quite a bit. This is part of the reason he has been running "Seoul Action School" at a gymnasium in Boramae Park since 1998. He established the facility jointly with four of his younger colleagues with the aim of producing martial art directors and stuntmen. Now the school boasts 25 key members, and recruits new members every six months and offers them free martial art training. He is doing all this just like Hong Kong martial art directors Cheong Xiaodong and Lawrence Full, who produce their own works while performing impressive acting as martial art directors at the same time. "I want to serve as a director because I believe I will perform better as a stuntman if I am good at directing and acting for movies and dramas," Chung said.

Leaping forward toward world stage

News reports say Chung has been picked as the martial arts director for the blockbuster movie "Mongol," which is being directed by the Russian director Sergei Bodrov. His participation in the movie, which constitutes part 1 of a three-part movie series on Genghis Khan the Great, holds special significance to Chung. Chung has been aspiring to advance into Hollywood and the international stage as a martial arts director, and by participating in the blockbuster movie in Russia, which is a highly promising movie market, he has effectively taken the important first step toward realizing his ultimate goal.

More than anything, Chung has always pursued new goals he has determined to take on. These include Korean-style stunt action using wires, and totally innovative stunt action that is unique only to him. He continues to spur himself to go beyond what he is today, rather than simply maintaining his lead in Korea. Considering Chung's diehard enthusiasm for stunt acting, we can expect to see Korean action movies continuing to make great strides throughout the world.

Profile

Born in 1966

Stunt actor and martial arts director

1990 Enters movie industry as a stunt actor for "the General's Son"

1992 Makes debut as a martial arts director in the movie "Sirasoni"

1996 Wins Special Contribution Award at MBC Acting Awards

Works

2005 Martial arts director for the movie "Blood Tears"

2005 Martial arts director for the movie "Bitter Sweet"

2006 Plays Chung Tae-soo's character and produces the movie "Zzakpae" as a co-producer, and produces many other works

Source: http://english.kbs.co.kr/mcontents/people/1401266_11674.html

[Guest ksen]

Wow! Rubie, thank you very much!! It is great!!!

I have very happy days now. My session was very successfully finished (I am surprised )), I received many new films from YesAsia and from friends (including "Damo" drama!) and I visited festival of Korean culture: http://jdh.iyapi.net/en/ks_fest.html

[melusine]

From Twitch's Chungmuro Daily:

It might not have been the huge hit his fans hoped it would become, but Ryu Seung-Wan's 짝패 (The City of Violence), and its good performance at the box office opened a few, new doors in Chungmuro. A new 'brand' for low-budget HD Action films has been formed by CJ Entertainment, Jung Doo-Hong's Seoul Action School and Nabi Pictures, who signed a MOU to produce films like The City of Violence, using SAS' know how in the genre, and CJ Entertainment's marketing power to make those films travel overseas. Nabi Pictures produced 무사 (Musa: The Warrior) and the upcoming Wuxia 중천 (The Restless), so they're definitely not newcomers on the scene. This new brand plans to produce around 5 films this year, and scripts are already in development, with Kim Sung-Soo -- director of Musa -- and Jung Doo-Hong acting as producers. Even though the budget for each of those works will be around the 1 Billion Won, thanks to the SAS the action will definitely be on par with the best Korea has to offer. Kim commented that even if those films don't have a big impact in terms of theatrical performance, they plan to build a strong fanbase both at home and abroad for Korean action films at least through DVD. All the films will be directed by newcomers. [Cine21 - 7/4]

From Kaiju Shakedown:

JUNG DOO-HONG IN NYC

Hong Kong has Yuen Wo-ping. Thailand has Panna Ritthikrai. And Korea has Jung Doo-Hong, who founded the Seoul Action School and has provided the action choreography for the best of the best movies. He appeared onscreen with Ryu Seung-Wan in CITY OF VIOLENCE and now he's coming to NYC to make LJ Films' first English-language movie, COMEBACK. LJ says that Korea's level of production now outstrips the Korean market and that the US B-movie market may actually be more lucrative than the entire Korean market put together. So they've set up an office in the US and are putting up around $3 million to shoot COMEBACK.

Jason Yee will star, and the movie sees him play a cop who's going after gangs in Chinatown and who gets framed for something or other and has to go to Korea to beat some people up and clear his name. I go to Chinatown a lot and the only crime I see is spitting in public and overpriced souvenirs being fobbed off on tourists, but then again it's quite possible I missed something.

It's set for completion in 2007 and the first draft of the script has been finished. I wonder if the Weinstein Company will be involved? They seem to have a taste for Asian action movies and a love of bargains so this could be right up their alley.

[Guest ksen]

Oh, I heard about that movie.. So JDH takes part in it indeed!? Great! Thanks!!!

[Guest ksen]

I prepare to go on vacation from July, 12 till August. Most likely this time I'll be off-line...

[Guest ksen]

"Korean actor Jung Doo-hong poses for a photo on Friday, 01 September 2006, in Venice during the press conference to promote the film 'Jak-pae' (The city of violence) at the 63rd edition of the Venice film festival."

[rubie]

09-05-2006

Director Ryoo Is Sole Presence at Venice

By Paolo Bertolin

Contributing Writer

Director Ryoo Seung-wan

VENICE, Italy . Ryoo Seung-wan's "City of Violence" (Chakpae) was the sole Korean film invited to this year's Venice Film Festival. Ryoo’s fifth feature film was screened at the festival, one of the world's leading film events, as part of the midnight screenings on Sept. 1st.

In "City of Violence," 'Action Kid' Ryoo has once again tracked the paths of genre filmmaking with film aptly reminiscent of the Oriental tradition of kung fu movies, blended with a zest of the peculiar brand of Western incepted by Italian master Sergio Leone, the spaghetti western.

It's a story of a Seoul cop who returns to his native town to investigate the suspicious murder of an old time friend, and uncovers a web of corruption revolving around the development of a casino in the city. Ryoo told us about the film in Venice.

Q: The original concept of "City of Violence" came from main actor Jung Doo-hung, a wellappreciated stunt and action choreographer. How did you work with him in developing the script and the shooting?

A: I had previously worked with Jung in my other films. For this movie, we developed the script together all along, and we also planned the action sequences and their choreography together. I believe that the movie, his martial arts and my work as director matched together very well, and combined in the best way possible.

Q: For the first time in "City of Violence" you are playing one of the main roles. Why did you choose to act in the film? Are you intending to act in your future projects as well?

A: I must confess that the primary reason was just financial. This film is a low budget production compared to my previous films, so I wanted to save money from the casting process. Furthermore, there's lot of hard action in City of Violence, which implies a risk of injury for the actor. I also thought that by playing this character myself, I would best express my views and feelings about him. However, I don't think you will see me acting in my next film.

Q: Some critics argued that the film is somehow inspired by Korean action movies of the 1960s and 1970s. Is it so?

A: It is not actually true. I would rather say that I was influenced by one of my favorite movies, Im Kwontaek's "Son of the General." You may actually notice that the climax scene of my film, the one in the tavern, reminds a lot a similar sequence of Im's film. Furthermore, I would say that there's a big deal of influence from the classics of Shaw Brothers in the film.

Q: Here at Venice, you took part in the demonstrations against the reduction of the screen quota in Korea. What is your view and on this burning issue?

A: Issues concerning the screen quota are politically and economically very complex. I would say the political side of it played a great part in the reduction. However I feel that the screen quota is needed to safeguard the health and success of Korean industry. That is why we need the largest support from the international film community.

ktculture@gmail.com

09-05-2006 20:48

Source: The Korea Times

http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/culture/20...20480311700.htm

[Guest ksen]

Hi, Rubie! Thanks!

How are you?

[rubie]

^Hi Kseniya! I'm alright... as always...hoping to find news updates to share.

Seems that the movie & it's cast is in Venice for the festival. Hope it'll garner positive feedback and critical reviews from the international movie crowd.

Always good to be here and seeing your postings, always take care... ok.

[Guest ksen]

The City of Violence

http://us.yesasia.com/en/PrdDept.aspx/sect...pid-1004477585/

Our Price: US$28.99

This product is expected to release on October 3, 2006. Pre-order your copy now!

[Guest ksen]

[Guest ksen]

It seems that JjakPae got no awards at the Venecia Festival

I'm disappointed.

Actually, I don't care, it's not the sport match where the criteria of victory are clear.

But even for me it is unpleasant to hear that, and that I can't do anything for Mr. Jung.

[Guest ksen]

I watched JJakPae! (in October I'll get a parcel from YesAsia with a DVD - movie+bonuses, but, of course, I couldn't wait for so long and downloaded the movie as soon as it was possible )

The movie impressed me so much that I cannot formulate my feelings... I will write more elaborately later, when I watch the movie for the second, third time, and my emotions would abate a little.

I can say now that my impression is related to the fact that the subject of the movie is very close to me - changing and betrayal of the friends, the easy attitude of the heroes to the evil, especially if they have some profit from their behavior... Well, and of course, the play of JDH that encharmed me as back as in Arahan...

[Guest ksen]

I outlined a short review at last.

Allow me to say this is not a U movie at all. This is a harsh action, and though violence scenes are not as cherished as they often are in this sort of movies, yet their quantity and quality are such that I still would not recommend it to general public. And yes, another reason is that the movie is also very dark emotionally, with tragic changes and friends betrayal being the leitmotif.

The movie proves with terrifying inevitability that circumstances can open an abyss of the worst feelings and intentions in a human being, the abyss that nobody will be able to close once it is opened, and that will transfer a man into a monster. Yet no one seems to care some are blinded by having close relations with the man, others are offered money to keep silence. And when the already-grown monster starts to destroy their lives, they are taken by surprise. The monster that could no longer be restrained. The one accustomed to impunity. The one they created with their own hands

Seems like a fairy-tale dragon, does it not?

As for the plot, it is quite unsophisticated. A country town witnesses a murder, the funerals of the deceased gather his school friends. One of them, Jeong Tae-Su (Jung Doo-Hong), who left the town to become a Seoul policeman 10 years ago, can see only too well that both the city and its people have changed. He suspects that there might be something behind his friends death

When I first read the plot, I feared it would be nothing more but a movie proclaiming vengeance as a supreme spiritual value. Yet I trusted Ryu Seung-Wan, and I was right after all)), though to be honest up to the middle my assurance was weakening But thank God it was due to Ryus wanting to create suspense.

I am sure you will say I am biased (and who is not talking arts?), yet I tried hard not to be, and even tried to imagine what would the movie be like with other actors in it (leaving alone live action scenes where neither stuntmen nor digital effects were used). Thats when I realized that the movie would impress me the same nevertheless. And it is still another thing that I adore Jung Doo-Hong. He is the only one who can play a one-minute role and make it unforgettable. I can imagine no one else who would make such a strong impression in No Blood No Tears and Arahan. He is the one whose talent and dedication helped us through the cruel world of City of Violence. I guess the world is the main character there a terrible and merciless world grinding people to dust, with nothing but their old photos in the wallet left. This world has no place for those who do not and cannot forget and betray friends and ideals. And yet, people like that, people like Tae-su, still live despite laws of nature that shall never be broken, do what they can, never lose faith and die to prove there is still something to live and die for

[rubie]

Oct 12, 2006 - Pusan International Film Festival

The Opening Night, Red Carpet arrival

CDH with actress, Kim Min Jun

Oct 13 - NAMOO Actors PIFF Hip hop Party on the night of 13th October at MARY Jane Club in Pusan

CDH with actress, Kim Tae Hee

Copied from the PIFF thread

http://www.soompi.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=89870

[rubie]

2006-10-17

Source: http://news.empas.com/issue/show.tsp/cp_jn...20061017n02582/

[rubie]

Image from CINE21

[Guest ksen]

Oh, thanks, Rubie!

Sorry for late reply - somehow I haven't got a notice about your post. And during the last month I had a session in the instiute, had a (small) surgery and was in a hospital for some time..

Just "coming to myself".... (trying to translate my questions to Mr. Jung into Korean in the meantime )

News: Mr. Jung is getting really popular in Korea. I notice that when I say his name Koreans exclaim: Ah, this is that star from JjakPae?" and in Cafe-Daum they write: "Kamdok-nim (Mr. Director) is getting fashionable in the manner of interview, clothing..."

In his filmography the movie "The Host" (Gwemul) can be added to his list as "martial art director"

[Guest ksen]

Hi everybody!

I have great news!

I met with Russian stuntmen-martial art directors and they introduced me to Korean actor studying in Mosocw theater institute and working with them in the action episodes! Park Hyeok-Su knows, is aqcuainted, and esteems JDH a lot, and he promised me to helped with translations of materials and communication with Mr. Jung! It seems like I can be useful for Su in his studying and work too....

Su said that Kamdok-nim (Mr. Director) has very nice temper, that actors who work with him usually keep good relations with him ever after.

Personally Su was astonished by the fact that Kamdok-nim preserved his soul pure notwithstanding his work with business, dealing with money, etc.

I learned from Su also that JDH was indeed the founder and director of S.A.S. for a long time. Before that Korean stuntmen were trained and made rehearsals just in gyms.

In Paju-si a branch of S.A.S. was seemingly opened but it occurred during those 4 years of Su's living in Russia, so he doesn't know details..

[rubie]

That's really good news, Kseniya... getting to meet someone who actually knows Mr. Jung firsthand! So happy for you, finally... greater things are beginning to happen. It is indeed a worthwhile and wonderful effort, someone is helping you with the articles and getting in contact with Mr. Jung, too.

And hope you have a great time helping with Mr. Park as well. Glad to know that Mr. Jung is indeed a really well-respected martial-arts director in the industry and gets along fine with everyone.