Mun Gwan-gyu - Lee Man-hee

A film director is like the captain of a cruise ship. Just as the captain is in charge of the whole process from setting sail to laying anchor, the director handles everything from the screenwriting stage through post-production. Unlike the captain, though, the director must also take responsibility for the finished product. The captains goal is simply a safe journey, but the director is judged by the public on the polish and commercial appeal of his or her films. Not all directors of outstanding artistry are able to win the public over, nor do successful commercial directors often receive recognition as great artists. Popularity and artistry are both values that a director must pursue, and in most cases, the director survives commercially at the expense of artistry. Too much artistic experimentation leaves them shunned by the public and by producers. The directors who find favor with the market are the ones who understand where to compromise between commerciality and artistry.

The director LEE Man-hee made films over a period from the 1960s through the 1970s. He considered film both as an art form and as life. His passion for film sometimes won audiences over; at other times, audiences and producers turned their backs. For him, though, film was the most important thing, and filmmaking more fascinating than any other form of activity.

In 1998, a number of Korean critics and film scholars, including this writer, came together to form a group called the Dialogue Association for Korean Film (Uri Yeonghwareul Wihan Daehwa Moim). Our main goal was to study Korean film history; we met with veterans of Korean film, listened to their accounts and recorded them. We also invited legendary Korean actors, directors and producers to give their stories. Their accounts included quite a bit of information not recorded in the annals of Korean film history. The first effort the group attempted was a verbal restoration of LEE Man-hees Full Autumn (1966). All of us tacitly recognized this film as a major work of Korean cinema, and LEE as a major director.

We heard about the making of Full Autumn from its producer, HO Hyun-chan. The lead actors, SHIN Seong-il and MOON Jung-suk, also offered their memories of the film and its director. SHIN shared that LEEs nickname was Jjanggu, a reference to his prominent forehead. From MOON, we learned that the director provided instructions to his actors by explaining things in a low whisper. The films director of photography, SEO Jeong-min, also explained about LEEs use of montage and described the director as having a strongly experimental spirit. Afterwards, screenwriters KIM Ji-heon and BAEK Gyeol told us about the differences between the original script and the shooting script for Full Autumn. The negative for Full Autumn may be lost, but the accounts provided by these veterans allowed certain significant scenes to be reconstructed from memory. They also recommended that we meet with the actress MUN Suk to hear more, but the star of LEEs final film, A Road to Sampo was then living abroad.

Over the course of this effort, we heard many of the same things about LEE Man-hee, which can be summed up in a few basic areas. First, they said that he had an exceptional passion for film. He was assisted in his film efforts by BAEK, SEO and MOON, who were collectively referred to as the LEE Man-hee Association. Whether attending film company meetings or going out to drink, the director spent his time in the Korean film capital of Chungmuro; in every case, filmmaking occupied center stage in his life.

Second, the people interviewed talked about the efforts LEE made to realize his cinematic aesthetic, how he would use whatever means necessary to get the scene he wanted. In order to give his war movies a greater sense of reality, he sought to use live rounds and actual bombers. In his camera angles, he aimed for originality; he wanted to avoid using the same angles seen in foreign films or the works of other Korean directors, instead looking for angles that were creative and difficult to achieve. In the 1960s, the system of Korean film was one of mass production. A director would produce some ten films within a single year. Even under these circumstances, however, LEE did not abandon his experimentation with cinematic aesthetics and grammar.

Third, they said that he had the support of his colleagues, who held deep affection for him. These supporterscinematographers, actors, screenwriters, producers, lighting technologywere his partners in the filmmaking process. Going by the name the 1.7 Club, they were centered around the core forces of the aforementioned LEE Man-hee Association.

Fourth, they talked about the constant presence of actors who represented the directors own personae. Actors like JANG Dong-whi, KIM Jin-kyu and SHIN Seong-il gave expression to his interior qualities, as did actresses like MOON Jung-suk, who was his lover in real life and starred in half of the directors total filmography, and MUN Suk, who was featured in his final works. In the films, these actors conveyed the directors own voice and ideas, and so he maintained close relationships with all of them.

Fifth, they said that his dedication to filmmaking led him to neglect his family. As a father, he was rarely home, and his family members have few memories of him.

Finally, his films indicate the directors conflicts with the system and with producers. The range of his creative expression was constrained by censorship under the military dictatorship; he was arrested for The Seven Female POWs (1965), and screening of Holiday (1968) was halted by a court ruling. He wound up on bad terms with government forces due to his refusal to make anti-Communist films and his making of anti-war films. A creative artistic spirit always chafes against the system and the times, and LEE was no exception to this rule.

Our research into the work and life of LEE Man-hee began with the recording efforts for Full Autumn and ultimately led to the writing of this volume. Encountering a director means encountering the films and culture of an age, and understanding a director connects with an understanding of art. Examining the works of LEE Man-hee led to an encounter with the aesthetics of Korean film, and the same time shared the experiences of a directors self-consciousness, suffering and creative struggle in the 1960s and 1970s.