Director's Statement

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I begin the storytelling process first as an observer. The world is open before me. Moments pass. I close my eyes and begin to fixate on the vision in my mind. That impression streams into a series of images that ultimately flows into a larger event. I open my eyes and experience an expansion of reality through image and sound.

Through deep observation and real-world interactions, I am able to recognize the motivation, emotion, and truths of my characters and their relationships. I bring them to life in a way that’s both visually honest and arousing. I am incredibly intrigued by stories driven by human relationships within cultural and social contexts. As a native Korean who became a US citizen, diversity and inclusion are themes that I actively pursue and represent in my films. My existence as a foreign observer enables me to empathize with minorities and underrepresented communities and empowers me to showcases their most authentic experience.

Creating films, for me, is very participatory. By first experiencing human nature through the lens, I then use film as a medium to connect me directly to the world around and beyond me. It’s through this time and space that my work starts to take shape into a narrative form. It’s my role to transform that narrative into a film. 

CLASSICS UNDONE displays a diverse group of people’s slices of life. But the life they are going through is not only their reality, but also reinterpreted story by the writer. The human connection in this story is not just part of real life but becomes an extended reality. After COVID pandemic, the reality has been redefined and expanded. CLASSICS UNDONE shows how we experience and understand the world in post-COVID era and re-establish human connection, once again. 

In order to get to the core of the physical and emotional reality, I closely follow the threads of the characters’ lives, asking myself questions, such as, “What is the meaning of the relationship? What destination is the relationship heading towards? What existential change do they experience through their relationships?” 

My goal is to permeate those ontological questions that flow into the story, until the story changes, evolves and finally reveals the core of human relationships and the connections that bind us.