Lee Chang-dong on His Eight-Year Gap Before Venice-Bound ‘Possible Love’ and MIFFest Lifetime Achievement Honor: ‘Thanks to Cinema, I Feel Connected to Something Much Bigger’
South Korean filmmaker Lee Chang-dong is returning to feature filmmaking with ‘Possible Love’, his first film since 2018’s ‘Burning’, which will compete at the Venice Film Festival. Speaking while receiving MIFFest’s Lifetime Achievement Award in Malaysia, he said the eight-year interval reflected personal and creative change rather than a withdrawal from cinema, and described the honour as encouragement to make stronger future work.
Lee said storytelling helps him understand life and communicate with audiences, whom he sees as central to his reasons for filmmaking beyond box-office or industry judgement. He cited Hou Hsiao-hsien’s 1983 film ‘The Boys From Fengkuei’ as a formative influence, noted his continuing work as a novelist, and welcomed Korean cinema’s global prominence while questioning whether younger filmmakers can sustain its creative momentum.
- Lee Chang-dong returns with Venice competition film ‘Possible Love’.
- His eight-year gap followed ‘Burning’ in 2018.
- He urges continued creative vitality in Korean cinema.