Joint Security Area (Korean: ?????? JSA) is a 2000 South Korean mystery thriller film starring Lee Young-ae, Lee Byung-hun and Song Kang-ho. It was directed by Park Chan-wook and is based on the novel DMZ by Park Sang-yeon. The film, which was shot on location in South Korea, concerns an investigation into the circumstances surrounding a fatal shooting incident within the DMZ, the heavily fortified border that separates North and South Korea.
Joint Security Area | |
---|---|
Joint Security Area movie poster | |
Hangul | ?????? JSA |
Hanja | ?????? JSA |
Revised Romanization | Gongdonggyeongbiguyeok jeieseuei |
McCune–Reischauer | Kongdonggy?ngbiguy?k cheies?ei |
Directed by | Park Chan-wook |
Produced by | Shim Jae-myung Lee Eun |
Written by | Kim Hyun-seok Jeong Seong-san Lee Moo-yeong Park Chan-wook |
Based on | DMZ by Park Sang-yeon |
Starring | Lee Young-ae Lee Byung-hun Song Kang-ho |
Music by | Jo Yeong-wook Bang Jun-seok |
Cinematography | Kim Seong-bok |
Edited by | Kim Sang-bum |
Production company | Myung Films |
Distributed by | CJ Entertainment |
Release date |
|
Running time | 110 minutes |
Country | South Korea |
Language | Korean English French German |
It was the highest-grossing film in Korean film history at the time and won Best Film at the 2000 Blue Dragon Film Awards and the 2001 Grand Bell Awards.
Screenplay
Two North Korean soldiers are killed in the DMZ at a North Korean border house, before Sergeant Lee Soo-hyeok (Lee Byung-hun), a South Korean soldier on border duties, attempts to flee back to the South Korean side. The southern troops rescue him while gunfire erupts and, two days later, the fragile relationship between the two Koreas depends on a special investigation conducted by Swiss Army Major Sophie E. Jean (Lee Young-ae) on behalf of the Neutral Nations Supervisory Commission.
As Sergeant Lee Soo-hyeok has confessed to the shootings, Sophie investigates why the two Koreas have contradicting accounts of events; Soo-hyeok's states he was knocked out and kidnapped while relieving himself and, waking tied up in the North Korean border house, secretly freed himself and shot three North Korean soldiers, leaving two dead. The North Korean survivor Sergeant Oh Kyeong-pil (Song Kang-ho) states that Soo-hyeok barged into the border house and shot everyone before retreating when the wounded Kyeong-pil returned fire.
The autopsy report shows that one soldier, Jeong Woo-jin (Shin Ha-kyun), was shot eight times repeatedly, indicating a grudge was held; additionally, a single bullet is not accounted for. Over the course of the investigation, witness Private First Class Nam Sung-shik (Kim Tae-woo) attempts suicide by jumping out of the window of the interrogation room and a strange emotional reaction between Kyeong-pil and Soo-hyeok during a meeting causes Sophie to confirm her suspicions that the surviving soldiers and Woo-jin held a mutual friendship and were attempting to protect one another.
Through flashbacks it is shown that Soo-hyeok had previously been on patrol with other soldiers, only to get lost on the North Korean side and to partially trip a mine; found by Kyeong-pil and Woo-jin, the two deactivate the mine, which later prompts Soo-hyeok to throw written messages over the border to maintain contact. Eventually inviting Soo-hyeok across the border, the three become a group of friends that soon includes Sung-shik, with the four agreeing to leave politics out of their friendship so to remain loyal to their own countries.
As tensions rise between the North and South, Soo-hyeok and Sung-shik return to the North to say goodbye and celebrate Woo-jin's birthday, only to be discovered by a commanding officer from the North and resulting in a Mexican Standoff. Despite Woo-jin panicking and betraying his friends, Kyeong-pil convinces Woo-jin, Soo-hyeok and the officer to lower their weapons, only for Sung-shik to panic and shoot the commanding officer when he reaches for his radio; when Woo-jin draws his gun again, Sung-shik shoots him, and in a daze, shoots his corpse several times. Earlier in their friendship when Soo-hyeok is joking around with his gun, Kyeong-pil asked Soo-hyeok if he'd ever had to kill a man like he's had to, implying that Soo-hyeok doesn't know what it's like. Kyeong-pil slaps Sung-shik out of his daze, takes the gun from him and kills the still-alive officer, then persuades Soo-hyeok and Sung-shik to flee with a false alibi of being kidnapped, before throwing away the evidence that he and Woo-jin were fraternizing with Southern soldiers. After shooting Kyeong-pil in the shoulder to complete the alibi, Soo-hyeok and Sung-shik flee across the border, with the latter getting past unseen; as Soo-hyeok's wounded leg from the firefight prevents him from running, he is the only soldier seen and picked up by soldiers.
Sophie is eventually removed from the case when it's discovered that her father, a former POW, had North Korean ties during the Korean War, thus technically making her a non-neutral. Before leaving, she attempts to informally learn of the true events first with Kyeong-pil and then Soo-hyeok. Having asked Kyeong-pil if he had a message for Soo-hyeok, Sophie gives Soo-hyeok the lighter he first gave to Kyeong-pil. Before saying goodbye and wishing him well, she reveals that Kyeong-pil told her that he saw Soo-hyeok's gun actually shot Woo-jin first during the chaos before Sung-shik shot him. On his way out, Soo-hyeok steals an officer's pistol and commits suicide out of guilt for Woo-jin's death and Sung-shik's suicide attempt. The film concludes with an American tourist's photograph of the joint security area that accidentally contains all four soldiers prior to the incident.
- Lee Young-ae as Major Sophie E. Jean
- Lee Byung-hun as Sergeant Lee Soo-hyuk (Korean: ???)
- Song Kang-ho as Sergeant Oh Kyung-pil (Korean: ???)
- Kim Tae-woo as Private Nam Sung-sik (Korean: ???)
- Shin Ha-kyun as Private Jung Woo-jin (Korean: ???)
- Christoph Hofrichter as Major general Bruno Botta
- Herbert Ulrich as Captain Persson
The film drew nearly half a million viewers in Seoul alone in its first week. Within 15 days of its release the film reached one million admissions and by early 2001 Joint Security Area had become the highest-grossing film in Korean film history. It was later passed by the films Friend, Silmido and Taegukgi: The Brotherhood of War. Overall, JSA had 2,499,400 admissions in Seoul over its 20 weeks in the cinemas and an estimated 5.8 million admissions nationwide. The film was also very successful in Japan where it grossed ¥1,160,000,000 becoming one of the top grossing foreign productions of 2001.
A DVD of the movie was presented to North Korea's leader Kim Jong-il by South Korea's President Roh Moo-hyun during the Korean summit in October 2007.
In 2009, director Quentin Tarantino named the film as one of his twenty favorite films since 1992.
2000 Blue Dragon Film Awards
- Best Film
- Best Director – Park Chan-wook
- Best Supporting Actor – Shin Ha-kyun
- Best Cinematography – Kim Seong-bok
2000 Busan Film Critics Awards
- Best Actor – Lee Byung-hun, Song Kang-ho
2000 Director's Cut Awards
- Best Director – Park Chan-wook
- Best Actor – Song Kang-ho
- Best New Actor – Shin Ha-kyun
- Best Producer – Shim Jae-myung
2001 Deauville Asian Film Festival
- Lotus d'Or (Prix du Jury) ("Jury Prize")
- Lotus du Public (Prix du Public) ("Popular Choice")
- Lotus du Meilleur Acteur ("Best Actor") – Song Kang-ho
2001 Seattle International Film Festival
- New Director's Showcase Special Jury Prize
2001 Berlin International Film Festival
- Nomination – Golden Berlin Bear
2001 Baeksang Arts Awards
- Best Director – Park Chan-wook
2001 Grand Bell Awards
- Best Film
- Best Actor – Song Kang-ho
- Best Sound – Kim Seok-weon, Kim Won-yong
- Best Art Direction
- Nomination – Best Supporting Actor – Shin Ha-kyun
2001 Fantasia Festival
- Nomination – Best Film
2002 Blue Ribbon Awards
- Best Foreign Language Film
2003 Hong Kong Film Awards
- Nomination – Best Asian Film
- Bollywood movies
- Latest Bollywood movies
- Download all bengali movies
- Download all bhojpuri movies
- Download all english movies
- Download all gujarati movies
- Download all hindi movies
- Download all kannada movies
- Download all malayalam movies
- Download all marathi movies
- Download all oriya movies
- Download all punjabi movies
- Download all tamil movies
- Download all telugu movies
- Bollywood action movies
- Bollywood adventure movies
- Bollywood animation movies
- Bollywood classical movies
- Bollywood comedy movies
- Bollywood crime movies
- Bollywood devotional movies
- Bollywood documentary movies
- Bollywood drama movies
- Bollywood family movies
- Bollywood fantasy movies
- Bollywood historical movies
- Bollywood history movies
- Bollywood horror movies
- Bollywood musical movies
- Bollywood mystery movies
- Bollywood mythological movies
- Bollywood patriotic movies
- Bollywood romance movies
- Bollywood romantic movies
- Bollywood sci-fi movies
- Bollywood social movies
- Bollywood spiritual movies
- Bollywood sports movies
- Bollywood suspense movies
- Bollywood thriller movies
- Bollywood war movies
- Hot actress list
- Hot gujarati actress list
- Hot tamil actress list
- Hot bhojpuri actress list
- Hot assam actress list
- Hot bihari actress list
- Hot jammu and kashmir actress list
- Hot gujarati actress list
- Hot haryana actress list
- Hot konkani actress list
- Hot marathi actress list
- Hot odia actress list
- Hot punjabi actress list
- Hot rajasthani actress list
- Hot kannada actress list
- Hot malayalam actress list
- Hot telugu actress list
- Hot tulu actress list
- Hot Actress list from Indian city
- Hot actress list from ahmedabad
- Hot actress list from alappuzha
- Hot actress list from bangalore
- Hot actress list from bangalore
- Hot actress list from bhopal
- Hot actress list from chandigarh
- Hot actress list from chennai
- Hot actress list from guwahati
- Hot actress list from hyderabad, india
- Hot actress list from indore
- Hot actress list from jaipur
- Hot actress list from kannur
- Hot actress list from kochi
- Hot actress list from kolkata
- Hot actress list from kollam
- Hot actress list from kottayam
- Hot actress list from kozhikode
- Hot actress list from lucknow
- Hot actress list from madurai
- Hot actress list from mangalore
- Hot actress list from mumbai
- Hot actress list from mysore
- Hot actress list from new delhi
- Hot actress list from patna
- Hot actress list from pune
- Hot actress list from thiruvananthapuram
- Hot actress list from thrissur
- Hot actress list from tiruchirappalli
- Hot actress list from vijayawada
- Hot actress list from visakhapatnam
- All Bollywood Movies
- Bollywood Celeb
- >Art Director
- >Audiography
- >Background Music
- >Banner
- >Choreographer
- >Cinematographer
- >Costume Designer
- >Dialogue Writer
- >Director
- >Distributor
- >Editor
- >Executive Producer
- >Hair Stylist
- >Lyricist
- >Music Director
- >Photographer
- >Playback Singers
- >Presenter
- >Producer
- >Production Company
- >Production Designer
- >Screenplay
- >Singer
- >Sound
- >Actor
- >Story Writer
- >Studio
- >Video Director
- >Miscellaneous
- >Publicity (pro)
- >Web Creator
- >Production Labs
- >Publicity Design
- >Publicity Stills
- >Writer
- >Miscellaneous Artists
- >Visual Effects
- >Reporter
- >Music Company
- >Shooting Studios
- >Picturised On
- >Line Producer
- >Co Producer
- >Asst Director
- >Casting Director
- >Cinematography
- >Choreography
- >Dialouge
- >Editing
- >Lyrics
- >Music
- >Story
- >Playback Singer Female
- >Playback Singer Male
- >Actor In A Comic Role (male/female)
- >Child Artiste
- >Ensemble Cast
- >Actor Popular Choice (male)
- >Actor Popular Choice (female)
- >Sa Re Ga Ma Pa Song Of The Year
- >Actor In Supporting Role
- >Actress In Supporting Role
- >Actor In Leading Role
- >Art Direction
- >Actress In Leading Role
- >Sound Recording
- >Costume Design
- >Special Effects
- >Action
- >Actor In A Negative Role
- >Lifetime Achievement Award
- >Cinematic Exellence (director)
- >Cinematic Exellence (male)
- >Cinematic Exellence (female)
- >International Male Icon
- >International Female Icon
- >Actor In A Supporting Role (male)
- >Actor In A Supporting Role (female)
- >Actor In A Comic Role
- >Playback Singer (male)
- >Playback Singer (female)
- >Most Promising Debut (female)
- >Most Promising Debut (male)
- >Most Promising Director
- >Sound Design
- >Lifetime Jodi
- >Marketed Film
- >Jury Award For Best Actor
- >Jury Award For Best Actress
- >Jury Award For Best Film
- >Jury Award For Best Director
- >Playback Singer(male)
- >Lifetime Acheivement Award (male)
- >Excellence Award
- >Jodi Award
- >Performer Of The Year
- >Presented By