The China Mail - Park Chan-wook, master of black comedy, returns to Venice

The director of "Old Boy" -- which thrust him into the international spotlight in 2004 after winning the Grand Prix at Cannes -- will premiere his latest feature, "No Other Choice" on the Lido on Friday night.

The thriller, about a veteran paper company employee and family man who is laid off and decides to kill off potential competitors for a new job, is among 21 films in competition for Venice's top award, the Golden Lion.

Park was last in Venice in 2005, with "Lady Vengeance", which won two awards, the final instalment in his "Vengeance Trilogy" which delved into the dark recesses of the human experience.

The director with a strong appetite for vengeance and forgiveness -- whose violent or erotic films are not afraid to shock -- won a best director award at Cannes three years ago for "Decision to Leave", a critically acclaimed romantic thriller.

The master of black comedy -- who often highlights social inequalities in his films -- has been a major influence on the South Korean film industry.

His bloody revenge thriller "Oldboy" followed a man imprisoned without explanation in a room for 15 years before being released to search for his tormentor.

The film is seen as having paved the the way for black comedy "Parasite" from fellow Korean Bong Joon Ho, which won Venice in 2019 and the Academy Award, the first time a non-English language feature has won Best Picture.

"You can't fully understand human beings if you only tackle things that are beautiful, comfortable, and optimistic," Park told the Busan International Film Festival in 2021.

"Only by recognising a person's darker desires and properly examining their existence will you know what human beings are made of."

Having studied philosophy at Sogang University in Seoul, the soft-spoken filmmaker is a great lover of literature, especially Zola and Philip Roth.

His 2009 vampire film "Thirst" was an adaptation of Zola's "Therese Raquin," and his lesbian romance "The Handmaiden" of 2016 is based on the novel "Fingersmith" by the British author Sarah Waters.

"No Other Choice" is based on the 1997 novel "The Ax" by Donald E. Westlake.

Park has worked extensively in television, notably the English-language mini-series "The Little Drummer Girl", adapted from John Le Carré's novel, and last year's HBO series "The Sympathizer" about a North Vietnamese spy.

C.Fong--ThChM