The 21 Best Korean Movies to Stream Now
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Korean TV shows get a lot of attention for their highly addictive and soapy plot lines, but it's really Korea's film industry, which began to flourish after the end of Japanese colonial rule in 1945, that has enjoyed a far more critically-esteemed international reputation—and one that was established long before Parasite. While Bong Joon-ho's brilliant, Oscar-winning masterpiece helped usher in a new era of Hallyu (the Korean Wave), a lot of credit goes to Park Chan-wook for really putting Korean cinema on the world map in 2003 with his violent classic, Oldboy. In the years since, Korean (and Korean-American) auteurs have developed cult followings for their richly layered storytelling, which ranges from arthouse thrillers to heartwarming comedies to big budget action. Below, a very small sampling of the best Korean movies worth adding to your watchlist now.
Oldboy
In 2017, a New York Times Magazine profile called director Park Chan-wook "the man who put Korean cinema on the map," and it's thanks to this 2003 hit, which won the Grand Prix at Cannes. It has all the winning elements of a great film: revenge, conspiracy, violent action sequences, and, at the center of it all, a legendary actor (Choi Min-sik).
Past Lives
Celine Song made her feature directorial debut with Past Lives, which she wrote based on her own experience immigrating to Canada from South Korea when she was 12. The poignant tale of love, loss, destiny, identity, and the selves we leave behind earned critical acclaim—and Oscar noms for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay.
Parasite
Besides being a superb film, what gave Parasite its unstoppable, Oscar-winning momentum may have been Bong Joon-ho's razor sharp take on universal subject matter: the ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor. Add in visually arresting set design and cinematography, a perfect mix of suspense and comedy, and Bong's mastery at social commentary and it's easy to see why this scathing portrait of greed and social inequality is one of the best films ever made.
Minari
Based on director Lee Isaac Chung's own childhood, Minari—starring Steven Yeun and Youn Yuh-jung, who won an Oscar for her supporting role—is really a quintessentially American tale about a family that moves to rural Arkansas to start a farm and chase the American dream. Along the way, and with the arrival of a grandmother from Korea, the film serves up a powerful lesson on resilience, family, and what it means to belong.
Return to Seoul
Directed by Cambodian-French director Davy Chou, this critically acclaimed film is centered on a 25-year-old Korean adoptee named Freddie (Park Ji-min), who ends up in Seoul for the first time in her life and embarks on a journey to find her biological parents and, in the process, discover herself.
Assassination
Korea's painful history, especially the 35 years the country spent under Japanese rule, is a constant source of cinematic inspiration. This 2015 hit—a revenge fantasy about a group of resistance fighters in 1930s Korea who plot to kill a pro-Japanese businessman and a high-ranking Japanese general—is one of the best on the subject.
Snowpiercer
An A-list cast (Chris Evans, Tilda Swinton, Ed Harris) was assembled for Bong Joon-ho's English-language debut (which later inspired an AMC series). In this post-apocalyptic world, humanity's only surviving members live aboard a train that perpetually circumnavigates the globe, with the rich living splendor at the front, and the poor relegated to the back. In revolt, these lower class citizens, led by Evans's character, fight their way forward—but this being a Bong production, things aren't quite what they seem.
Miss Granny
In this hilarious, and touching, film, a septuagenarian widow has just learned her son is going to send her to a nursing home. She enters a photo studio to take what she believes will be her funeral portrait but is instead transported into the body of her 20-year-old self. The premise was such a huge success that a remake of this 2014 comedy has been done in eight countries around the world (and counting).
The Handmaiden
Park Chan-wook's feminist masterpiece was inspired by Sarah Waters's Fingersmith, except it trades the book's Victorian-era setting for 1930s Korea under Japanese rule. The thriller begins with a simple enough premise: a man hires a young pickpocket to help him seduce a Japanese heiress for her fortune. But of course things soon begin to unravel in ever more twisted ways.
Okja
Anyone who has seen Parasite and Snowpiercer knows that Bong Joon-ho is a pro at searing social commentary (see also: The Host). The metaphor is especially poignant in Okja, his 2017 film about a young girl and her genetically modified super pig. When the corporation that created the animal comes to take it away, she joins forces with an animal liberation group to save her beloved pet from slaughter.
Burning
This 2018 psychological thriller, directed by Lee Chang-dong, uses the premise of a love triangle—between a working class man named Jong-su, his childhood friend Hae-mi, and her mysterious, rich, and possibly very disturbed new acquaintance Ben (played by Steven Yeun)—to deliver a sharp critique of the deep economic divisions that plague Korean society.
Mother
Yet another cult hit by Bong Joon-ho, Mother also exemplifies his characteristically subversive style. The titular mother, played by Kim Hye-ja, is a hardworking single parent who lives with and takes care of her mentally disabled adult son Do-joon (played by Won Bin). When a local girl is found murdered, Do-joon is arrested, tricked into signing a confession, and jailed, leaving his mother to investigate the crime herself and do whatever it takes to find the real killer.
Decision to Leave
Think Anatomy of a Fall, but with Park Chan-wook's signature twisty sensibility. Part neo-noir, part-romance, this 2022 film, which won Park the Best Director prize at Cannes, stars Park Hae-il as a detective investigating the death of a man, whose wife, played by Chinese actress Tang Wei, becomes his prime suspect—and love interest.
Veteran
The moral depravity of the country's chaebol (family-run conglomerates) is a frequently explored subject in Korean films and TV. Veteran explores the theme by pitting a detective against an arrogant scion, while using several moments of comedy to bring levity to the sad fact that its portrayal of superrich kids behaving terribly isn't much of an exaggeration.
Kill Boksoon
Veteran actress Jeon Do-yeon, who has been a mainstay at Cannes since 2007 (she became the first Korean to win the Best Actress award at the festival that year for Secret Sunshine, and became the first Korean actress to serve on the main competition jury in 2014) stars in this 2023 Netflix film as a single mom of a bratty private school teen who secretly moonlights as a hired assassin. Her kill success rate is 100%. As for her parenting? Not so much.
Scandal Makers
In this 2008 classic, early aughts comedy king Cha Tae-hyun plays a thirty-something radio DJ and former teen idol who finds out that he is a grandfather when a young woman claiming to be his daughter shows up at his apartment with her son in tow. When paparazzi snap the trio, rumors spread that father and daughter are a romantic couple. Hilarity ensues.
The Thieves
An ensemble cast of Korea's top stars, including Jun Ji-hyun, Kim Hye-soo, Kim Soo-hyun, and Lee Jung-jae, star in this Ocean's Eleven-like heist comedy about a motley crew of ten thieves who band together to steal a valuable diamond from a Chinese crime boss.
The Man from Nowhere
In this 2010 film, early aughts heartthrob Won Bin plays a reclusive former secret agent who comes out of retirement to save a little girl—his only friend—who has been kidnapped by a violent drug gang. The movie was, to date, the actor's final onscreen apperance.
Train to Busan
A divorced father and his daughter board a train bound for Busan, but just before its doors close, a woman-turned-zombie slips in. Like the best zombie apolcalypse tales, Train to Busan is more about the undertones of class warfare set within a train. And about answering the real question: Who are the real monsters?
Extreme Job
This 2019 box office smash follows a group of narcotics detectives who are tasked with carrying out an undercover operation to bust an international drug gang. They purchase a fried chicken restaurant as a cover for their stakeouts, but, in a hilarious twist, the place becomes a viral sensation.
I Saw the Devil
Korean auteurs are famously liberal when it comes to graphic details but even by these standards, I Saw the Devil is not for the faint of heart. There is violence and gore in spades in this movie, starring Lee Byung-hun as a secret agent hellbent on getting revenge on the serial killer (played by Oldboy's Choi Min-sik) who viciously murdered his pregnant fiancée. You've been warned.
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