I've made the film 'The Good, the Bad, the Weird,' which was an Eastern Western film. Obviously, the Western film is American and American only; there's really no Western genre over in Asia.
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Lionsgate and Lorenzo di Bonaventura saw my Korean Western-style film, 'The Good, the Bad, the Weird,' and probably felt that I would be right for 'The Last Stand,' which could be classified as a modern Western.
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In Korea, the director is on top, and the power flows down vertically. On the set, I love to come up with ideas on the spot. But in Hollywood, if I were to come up with a certain idea on set, the idea had to be taken to all these different people who had to agree.
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The Western is as American as a film can get - there's the discovery of a frontier, the element of a showdown, revenge, and determining the best gunman. There's a certain masculinity to the Western that really appealed to me, and I've always wanted to do a Western in Hollywood.
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Of course, 'The Last Stand' has a villain who is traveling to the border to fulfill his own desires, but it's more about the main character. The Sheriff putting a stop to this villain and defending his town. 'The Last Stand' is more about protecting something. About protecting a value.
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I'm not an outgoing person. Compared to an average person, I am quite skeptical and pessimistic. This is different from being nervous.
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What can possibly be the common factor in a Kim Jee-woon film? I think what really ties a lot of my projects together is that there is always a character that believes his life is not exactly the way he wishes it to be.
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A lot of people are very interested that a Korean director has made a western. But when I look at the reactions of the audience, I realise the points at which people laugh are the same for a Korean audience and an international audience.
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Hollywood's never really been the ultimate goal for me.