Kim Ki-young

Kim Ki-young was born in the Gyo-dong neighborhood of Seoul—now part of Gyeongun-dong in Jongno-gu{{cite web |url=http://www.jongno.go.kr/wcms4/page?pageId=290025751&C_290008854_290008855=%EA%B2%BD%EC%9A%B4%EB%8F%99&C_290008854_0=290009652&C_290008854_290008853=%EC%A2%85%EB%A1%9C1234%EA%B0%80&LIST_PAGE_ID_290008854=270005366|title=경운동 (Gyeongundong)|access-date=February 5, 2008|publisher=Jongno Culture|language=ko|quote=교동은 경운동·낙원동·종로2가~종로3가에 걸쳐 있는 마을이다. (Gyo-dong neighborhood is (now) Gyeongun-dong and Nagwon-dong, which make Jongno 2nd Street and Jongno 3rd Street.)}} {{Dead link|date=September 2010|bot=H3llBot}}—on October 10, 1922.{{cite book |last=Lee|first=Young-il|title=The History of Korean Cinema|year=1988|publisher=Motion Picture Promotion Corporation|location=Seoul|isbn=89-88095-12-X|page=319}} His family had lived in Seoul for several generations, and his grandfather was a guard at Gwanghwamun.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|title=Biography, Part 1|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Lee|first=Youn-Yi|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505192939/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}} Kim's family was well-educated and artistically inclined. His father, Kim Seok-jin, was an English teacher, and his mother, Han Jin-cho, was also a teacher and a graduate of Gyeonggi Women's College. Both painted as a hobby. The family had two daughters, and Kim Ki-young was their only son. One of his sisters graduated as an art major from Seoul National University, and the other majored in dance at Ewha Womans University. His sister's encouraged the young Kim to develop his own creativity.{{cite web|url=http://www.allmovie.com/cg/avg.dll?p=avg&sql=2:384885~T1|title=Kim Ki-young: Biography|access-date=January 25, 2008|last=Vick|first=Tom|publisher=Allmovie|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060426195934/http://www.allmovie.com/cg/avg.dll?p=avg|archive-date=April 26, 2006}} The family moved to Pyongyang in 1930, where they stayed for the next 10 years. At Pyongyang National High School, Kim showed exceptional talent in music, painting and writing, and his studious nature earned him the nickname "Professor of Physics".김기영 (Kim Ki-young) at KMDb Korean Movie Database: "주위로부터 '물리학 박사'라는 소리까지 듣게 된다." While still a student, one of Kim's poems was published in a Japanese newspaper, and he was awarded first prize in a painting competition.{{cite web|url=http://www.kmdb.or.kr/actor/mm_basic.asp?person_id=00004686&div=2 |title=김기영 (Kim Ki-young) |access-date=January 29, 2008 |publisher=Korean Movie Database |language=ko |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080227011241/http://www.kmdb.or.kr/actor/mm_basic.asp?person_id=00004686&div=2 |archive-date=February 27, 2008 }}

Despite his artistic talents, Kim's main interest was medicine, and he applied for entrance into medical school upon graduation from high school in 1940. When he failed to gain admittance, Kim moved to Japan, planning to study and save up money to reapply for medical school.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|title=Biography, Part 2|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Lee|first=Youn-Yi|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040509084520/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/bio2.htm|archive-date=May 9, 2004 }} The theater and cinema grew into lifetime interests at this time. Kim often went to Kyoto, where he attended many stage productions and saw many international films. Josef von Sternberg's Morocco (1930) and Fritz Lang's M (1931) made a particularly strong impression on him, and their influence was to show in his mature film style.

Kim returned to Korea in 1941, initially planning to work as a dentist, but instead immersing himself in the study of drama. At this time he was particularly interested in classical Greek theater, Ibsen and Eugene O'Neill.{{cite web|title=A Korean master: Kim Ki-Young retrospective at the French 'Cinematheque' |url=http://www.koreasociety.org/film_blog/news/a_korean_master_kim_ki-young_retrospective_at_the_french_cinematheque.html |access-date=January 28, 2008 |publisher=koreasociety.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080227095114/http://www.koreasociety.org/film_blog/news/a_korean_master_kim_ki-young_retrospective_at_the_french_cinematheque.html |archive-date=February 27, 2008 }} To avoid conscription by the Japanese into the military, Kim returned to Japan briefly before 1945. He returned to Pyongyang where he studied Stanislavsky's theories of acting{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/KKYINT1.htm|title=An Interview (with Kim Ki-young) to Mark the Pusan Retrospective|access-date=February 7, 2008|last=Kim|first=Young-jin|author2=Kwon Yong-min |author3=Park Ji-yeon |author4=Lee Sang-yong |publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040508040726/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/KKYINT1.htm|archive-date=May 8, 2004}} and founded a theatrical group called "The Little Orchid". In 1946 Kim enrolled in Seoul Medical School, Seoul National University, and graduated with a major in dentistry in 1950. While attending university, his theatrical activities continued. He founded the National University Theater in 1949, and with this group staged many works of the Western theater, including Ibsen's Ghosts, Čapek's Robots, Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice, and works by Chekhov and O'Neill. The main actress Kim worked with while at the university was Kim Yu-bong, who would later become his wife.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYI.htm|title=From Melodrama to Realism to Expressionism: The Early Career of Kim Ki-young|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Kim|first=Sung-Eun|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505053647/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYI.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}}

Kim was an intern at Seoul University Medical Clinic when the Korean War broke out. He went to Pusan on June 1, 1951, the day the North Korean army retreated. In Pusan, Kim met Oh Young-jin, a fellow Pyongyang National High School graduate. Oh, who would later write the screenplay to the popular film The Wedding Day (1956), was producing newsreels for the Korean News through the Bureau of Public Information, and helped Kim get a job writing screenplays with this organization. With Oh's help, Kim got a job working for the United States Information Service in Jinhae. The job helped shape Kim's life in several ways. With the increase in pay he received from the U.S.I.S., he was able to marry Kim Yu-bong in 1951, and their first son, Kim Dong-won, was born in 1952. They would have a daughter born in 1955 and a second son, Kim Dong-yang, born in 1958. The two remained married for the rest of their lives. Kim Yu-bong supported her husband's filmmaking career through her dental practice, giving him a unique degree of independence among Korean filmmakers of his era to pursue his own personal visions. At a career retrospective during the last year of his life, Kim commented, "My wife's support has been unflagging over the years, even if, at times, she has seen one of my films and cried 'What have you done with my money?' But at rare moments like this retrospective, she becomes very emotional, recognizing that finally it has all been worthwhile."{{cite web |first=Chuck|last=Stephens|url=http://www.sfbg.com/AandE/32/36/monster.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20020802151752/http://www.sfbg.com/AandE/32/36/monster.html|date=June 10, 1998|access-date=January 19, 2008|archive-date=August 2, 2002|title=Meet Mr. Monster: A peek inside the cine-crypt of Kim Ki-young|publisher=San Francisco Bay Guardian}}

Kim filmed about 20 documentaries for the U.S.I.S. with such titles as Diary of the Navy and I Am a Truck for "Liberty News". The latter title was given an award by the U.S. State Department. The training and equipment Kim gained while working on these propaganda newsreels for the U.S.I.S. also enabled him to direct his first commercial film, Box of Death (1955). Kim used expired film stock and a manually operated camera from the U.S.I.S. to make this debut feature, an anti-communist melodrama about war orphans.{{cite web|url=http://www.kmdb.or.kr/eng/md_basic.asp?nation=K&p_dataid=00276 |title=The Box of Death (Jugeom-ui sangja)(1955) |access-date=January 28, 2008 |publisher=Korean Movie Database |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080227011245/http://www.kmdb.or.kr/eng/md_basic.asp?nation=K&p_dataid=00276 |archive-date=February 27, 2008 }} The film, now lost, showed stylistic influences from the Italian neo-realists and was the first Korean film to employ synchronous sound.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Window/LYK.htm|title=The Sunlit Path: Another Side of Kim Ki-young and Mapping the Korean Cinema of the 1950s|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=Lee|first=Yong-Kwan|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505193105/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Window/LYK.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}}

File:Yangsan do poster.jpg (1955).]]With the success of this first film, Kim was able to direct his second feature, the historical costume drama Yangsan Province (also 1955), again using primitive equipment obtained from the U.S.I.S. Although Kim claimed to have based the film on a traditional song he learned from his mother, no exact source for the story has been found. It is suspected that the director made up the story himself, modeling it on traditional stories such as Chunhyangjeon, Lee Kyu-hwan's remake of which had recently become a major success, stimulating a rebirth in Korean cinema.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/KSE.htm|title=The Sunlit Path: Between a Legendary Pre-Modern World and Kim Ki-young's Signature Themes and Style|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=Kim|first=Sung-Eun|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505193917/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/KSE.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}} After Lee's Chunhyangjeon, Yangsan Province was the second most successful Korean film of 1955.Lee, Young-il. p.295. Though a popular success, critics of the time were not kind to Yangsan Province. Yoo Do-yeon called the film a "work of bad taste," and Heo Baek-nyeon said that it "debases the dignity of Korean cinema." As his only surviving film of the 1950s, Yangsan Province sheds considerable light on Kim Ki-young's early career.{{cite web|url=http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_10.asp |title= (1955) |access-date=February 8, 2008 |publisher=koreafilm.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080223083817/http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_10.asp |archive-date=February 23, 2008 }} In an era in which Korean film critics considered realism to be important, the now-lost ending to Yangsan Province, in which two dead lovers ascend to heaven on a beam of light, was harshly criticized. In light of Kim's later career, critics today believe that this cut scene displays some of the most recognizable characteristics of Kim's mature style such as an interest in the fantastic, and a jarring blending of genres.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/CB2.htm|title=Genrebender: Kim Ki-young Mixes It Up|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=Berry|first=Chris|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031209001837/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/CB2.htm|archive-date=December 9, 2003}} Other motifs that were to be explored in depth in Kim's later work can also be found in Yangsan Province, such as animal imagery, particularly the use of hens as a representation of fertility and sexuality.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/KSE2.htm|title=Animals in the House of Kim Ki-young: Hens, Rats and Cracks in the Modern Family|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=Kim|first=Sung-Eun|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505194058/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/KSE2.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}}

In 1956 Kim started Kim Ki-young Productions, and began making melodramas, the most popular film genre in South Korea at the time. His first independent production was Touch-Me-Not (1956). In 1957, Kim was living near the red-light district of Yongsan, and the atmosphere of this neighborhood influenced his films, A Woman's War and Twilight Train (both 1957). With First Snow (1958), Kim moved from melodrama to a more socially conscious realism. Defiance of a Teenager (1959) and Sad Pastorale (1960) followed in this style. Defiance of a Teenager was one of Kim's most successful and respected early works, and he attended the San Francisco International Film Festival in 1960 for a showing of this film.{{cite web|url=http://www.cinekorea.com/filmmakers/kimkiyoung.html |title=Kim, Ki-young Master of Madness (From the 41st San Francisco International Film Festival) |access-date=January 19, 2008 |publisher=www.cinekorea.com |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080212202437/http://www.cinekorea.com/filmmakers/kimkiyoung.html |archive-date=February 12, 2008 }}

{{main|The Housemaid (1960 film)}}

1960 was a critical year for South Korea, marking the end of the rule of Syngman Rhee through the civilian April Revolution. In 1962, another military authoritarian, General Park Chung-Hee, would ascend to power and rule South Korea for nearly two decades. The short period of relative freedom between these two administrations was known as the Second Republic. During this time, filmmakers took advantage of the relaxation of governmental control over the film industry to create several boldly experimental works. Director Yu Hyun-mok's film Aimless Bullet (1960) dates from this period, as does Kim Ki-young's major breakthrough, The Housemaid (also 1960).{{cite web |url=http://www.koreanfilm.org/kfilm60s.html|title=1960-1969|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=Paquet|first=Darcy|publisher=koreanfilm.org}} A lurid, expressionistic melodrama set in an eerie house, involving sexual obsessions, murder and rats, this is the first film in which Kim's mature style is fully evident, and is widely regarded as one of the greatest Korean films ever made.

The film is a domestic thriller telling of a family's destruction by the introduction of a sexually predatory femme fatale into the household. A composer has just moved into a two-storey house with his wife and two children. When his wife becomes exhausted from working at a sewing machine to support the family, the composer hires a housemaid to help with the work around the house. The new housemaid behaves strangely, catching rats with her hands, spying on the composer, seducing him and eventually becoming pregnant by him. The composer's wife convinces the housemaid to induce a miscarriage by falling down a flight of stairs. After this incident, the housemaid's behavior becomes increasingly more erratic. She kills the composer's son, and then persuades the composer to commit suicide with her by swallowing rat poison. The film ends with the composer reading the story from a newspaper with his wife. The narrative of the film has apparently been told by the composer, who then warns the film audience that this is just the sort of thing could happen to anyone.{{cite web|url=http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_20.asp |title=The Housemaid (Hanyeo) (1960) |access-date=January 30, 2008 |publisher=koreafilm.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080223083913/http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_20.asp |archive-date=February 23, 2008 }}{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Window/AJS.htm|title=The Housemaid and Troubled Masculinity in the 1960s|access-date=January 28, 2008|last=An|first=Jin-soo|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031212045146/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Window/AJS.htm|archive-date=December 12, 2003}}

The Housemaid marked Kim's full break with realism, the main style of Korean cinema at the time, into his own version of expressionism. The plot, themes and even character names set out in The Housemaid were to be revisited by Kim repeatedly in his later career. Besides the first film, the official "Housemaid Trilogy" consists of Woman of Fire (1971) and Woman of Fire '82 (1982).{{cite web|url=http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_50.asp |title= (1971) |access-date=January 30, 2008 |publisher=koreafilm.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120208073844/http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_50.asp |archive-date=February 8, 2012 }} Also, at least two other later films—Insect Woman (1972) and Beasts of Prey (1985)—are, in some ways, remakes of The Housemaid. By using the story as a template, Kim was able to emphasize different aspects of the scenario, and to concentrate on different details and aspects of the central situation with each new re-telling.

Kim solidified his break with cinematic realism by following The Housemaid with two more films exploring styles and mixing genres, radically new for Korean cinema at the time. The Sea Knows (1961) transcended its roots in the standard anti-Japanese World War II film to become a distinctive examination of humanity, sadism, greed, lust for power and sexuality.{{cite web|url=http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_26.asp |title=The Sea Knows (Hyeonhaetaneun algo itda) (1961) |access-date=January 28, 2008 |publisher=koreafilm.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080223083943/http://www.koreafilm.org/feature/100_26.asp |archive-date=February 23, 2008 }} The box-office success of this film enabled Kim to buy his first house, in the Namsan district of Seoul. Goryeojang (1963), dealt with a similar subject matter as The Ballad of Narayama (1983), directed by Shohei Imamura, a filmmaker with whom Kim has often been compared. Kim's version of the story is marked by his mixing of genres. For example, he frames the story—which deals with an ancient tradition in which elders were abandoned to die—within a modern lecture on birth control.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Koryojang-f11.htm|title=Koryojang|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Kim|first=Sung-Eun|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031230050823/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Koryojang-f11.htm|archive-date=December 30, 2003}}

Some of the characteristic traits of Kim's mature style, first seen in these three films, are gothic excess, surrealism, horror, perversions and sexuality.{{cite web|url=http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_1999_Sept_2/ai_55638068 |date=June 10, 1998 |access-date=January 19, 2008 |title=UCLA Film and Television Archive Presents the Diabolical Cinema of Kim Ki-Young - October 16–28, 1999 |publisher=UCLA Film and Television Archive |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080228063752/http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_1999_Sept_2/ai_55638068 |archive-date=February 28, 2008 }} Although in stark contrast to the realism, harmony, balance and sentimentality typical of Korean cinema of the time, Kim's films, in an eccentric and metaphorical way, deal with the realities of postwar, industrializing South Korean society and psychology. After having firmly established his auteur status with these films, Kim's unique vision began to wane in his films of the later 1960s.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/KSN.htm|title=Kim Ki-young's Auteur Spirit|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Gim|first=Su-nam|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031210004123/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/KSN.htm|archive-date=December 10, 2003}}

During the 1970s, South Korea's film industry was at a low point due to government censorship and underfunding. Because of the poor state of the local film industry, cinema attendance in South Korea had dropped drastically since its high-point in the 1960s.{{cite web |first=Darcy|last=Paquet|url=http://koreanfilm.org/history.html|title=A Short History of Korean Film|access-date=February 3, 2008|publisher=koreanfilm.org}} Kim Ki-young, however, working independently in B-movie-like genre films, began to produce some of his most innovative and personal works at this time.{{cite book |editor=Victoria Wiggins|last=Kalat|first=David|title=501 Movie Directors|year=2007|publisher=Barron's Educational Series, Inc.|location=London|isbn=978-0-7641-6022-6|chapter=Ki-young Kim|page=240}} Kim fully regained his auteurist spirit with Woman of Fire (1971), the second of his Housemaid trilogy. The use of color, particularly reds and blues to express the anxiety and desires of the film's characters, distinguished this film from the original Housemaid's dark, shadowy black-and-white photography.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/AMH.htm|title=Representing the Anxious Middle Class: Camera Movement, Sound, and Color in The Housemaid and Woman of Fire|access-date=February 3, 2008|last=Ahn|first=Min-hwa|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040506062157/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Stairway/AMH.htm|archive-date=May 6, 2004}} For this film, Kim was named Best Director at the Blue Dragon Film Awards and actress Youn Yuh-jung was given Special Mention for Best Actress at the Festival de Cine de Sitges.{{cite web |url=http://koreanfilm.org/awards.xls|title=Awards|format=XLS|access-date=February 3, 2008|publisher=koreanfilm.org}}{{cite web |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0262415/awards|title=Awards for Hwayo (1970)|access-date=February 3, 2008|publisher=IMDb}} Not only popular with the critics, Kim's independently produced films were box-office successes during this era in which most films were harmed through heavy governmental interference. In 1972 Kim's Insect Woman was the only film to sell more than 100,000 tickets in Seoul and won Kim the Best Director prize at the Baeksang Arts Awards in 1973.Lee, Young-il. p.300, 320.{{cite web|url=http://www.mydvdlist.co.kr/mdlkth/movie/movie.asp?moviecode=16574 |title=충녀 - 蟲女 (1972) (Chungnyeo / Insect Woman) |access-date=February 3, 2008 |publisher=mydvdlist.co.kr |language=ko |quote=<수상> 1973년 백상예술대상 감독상 (김기영) |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080228140708/http://www.mydvdlist.co.kr/mdlkth/movie/movie.asp?moviecode=16574 |archive-date=February 28, 2008 }}

Kim's associates characterize the director as an eccentric individual. Tokyo International Film Festival programming director Kenji Ishizaka recalls that Kim's way of writing a screenplay was to walk away from home for three months. He would shut himself up in a cheap hotel, listen to neighborhood gossip, and write all night in the dark.{{cite web|url=http://www.tiff-jp.net/report/daily_en.php?itemid=535 |date=December 7, 2007 |access-date=February 3, 2008 |title=Inuhiko Yomota talks about Kim Ki-young, the Korean giant "Goryeojang" talk show |publisher=tiff-jp.net |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226215617/http://www.tiff-jp.net/report/daily_en.php?itemid=535 |archive-date=February 26, 2008 }} South Korean film critic Lee Young-il remembers that Kim's shoes were never shined, and that one of his few material pleasures was gourmet coffee. Kim Ki-young's unconventional and nonconformist nature also prevented him from participating in South Korea's mainstream film industry.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYIINT.htm|title=Lee Young-Il remembers Kim Ki-young|access-date=December 26, 2007|last=Berry|first=Chris|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031209011527/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYIINT.htm|archive-date=December 9, 2003}} The only official title he held within the film community was member of The National Academy of Arts, which he joined in 1997, and he did not cultivate friendships with journalists who could further his career.

Nevertheless, since the early 1960s, Kim Ki-young's status as one of the greatest and most original Korean film directors had never been in doubt. His stylistic preoccupation with sexuality, horror and melodrama had earned Kim the nickname, "Mister Monster" from his admirers.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/CB1.htm|title=Kim Ki-Young and the Critical Economy of the Globalized Art-House Cinema|access-date=December 26, 2007|last=Berry|first=Chris|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031212134526/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/CB1.htm|archive-date=December 12, 2003}} However, by the 1980s Kim's career had fallen into neglect. His continued fascination with B-movie exploitation themes as well as the increasingly obsessive and subversive nature of his films resulted in his isolation from the film community, and in financial failures at the box-office. The last of the Housemaid trilogy, Woman of Fire '82 (1982) is an even more radicalized and baroque retelling of the same basic story he had filmed numerous times in the previous two decades. By the mid-1980s, Kim's film output had slowed and finally stopped.

In the early 1990s Kim's work began to be rediscovered by South Korean cult film fans who discussed his films through the Internet and exchanged hard-to-find copies by videotape. Noticing this growing domestic Kim Ki-young cult, the Dongsung Cinematheque, an art-house theater in Seoul, programmed a retrospective showing of Kim's films.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/CSIINT.htm|title=The Kim Ki-young Revival: An Interview with Chung Sung-ill|access-date=December 26, 2007|last=Lee|first=Sun-Hwa|author2=Ahn Min-hwa |publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031209005842/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/CSIINT.htm|archive-date=December 9, 2003}} With his profile again high in Korean film society, Kim's work began to attract international attention. Five of his films were screened at the Tokyo International Film Festival in 1996. When Kim Ki-young's career was highlighted at the second Pusan International Film Festival in 1997, his work found enthusiastic new audiences in the international film community. The strongly positive reception of Kim's work by international audiences surprised the festival organizers, who immediately began receiving requests for overseas retrospectives of Kim's career.{{cite web |first=Chris|last=Berry|url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYKINT.htm|title=Going Global: An Interview with Lee Yong-kwan|access-date=January 21, 2008|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031209012310/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/LYKINT.htm|archive-date=December 9, 2003}} With this renewed interest, Kim began work on a comeback film to be titled Diabolical Woman. The Berlin International Film Festival invited him to attend a showing of his films in 1998.{{cite web |url=http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum98/kim-ki-young.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19991012180347/http://www.fdk-berlin.de/forum98/kim-ki-young.html|date=June 10, 1998|archive-date=October 12, 1999|title=Kim Ki-Young (1919 - 1998)|access-date=January 19, 2008|publisher=freunde der deutschen kinemathek|language=de, en}} Before Kim started work on the film or attended the festival, he and his wife were killed in a house fire caused by an electrical short circuit on February 5, 1998.

Kim Ki-young's death did not stop the revival of interest in his films. A six-film retrospective of Kim's career was shown in San Francisco twice in 1998. Within the year, Kim's films were screened at the Belgrade International Film Festival, the London Pan-Asian Film Festival, the Estate Romana and the Paris Videothèque.{{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/Festival.htm|title=Kim Ki-young on the Festival Circuit|access-date=January 21, 2008|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505001337/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/What-Saw/Festival.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}} Few prints of Korean films before the 1970s survive, and at one point 90% of Kim's output was considered lost. Under the "Kim Ki-young Renaissance Project", the Korean Film Council (KOFIC) has worked to find Kim's lost films and to restore those that are damaged. In 2006, the French Cinémathèque presented 18 of Kim's films, many of them newly rediscovered and restored through the efforts of the KOFIC.

During his lifetime, Kim gained many supporters among the younger generation of South Korean directors. Park Kwang-su reportedly admires Kim Ki-young above all other directors, and Lee Chang-ho is another of Kim's followers. In the years since his death, Kim's influence on Korean cinema has continued to be seen through the work of the current generation of South Korean filmmakers, including such prominent directors as Im Sang-soo and Kim Ki-duk. Bong Joon-ho calls Kim his mentor and favorite director.{{cite web |url=http://www.indiewire.com/people/2007/03/indiewire_inter_52.html|title=indieWIRE INTERVIEW: "The Host" director Bong Joon-ho|date=March 13, 2007|access-date=February 7, 2008|publisher=IndieWire|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080226213650/http://www.indiewire.com/people/2007/03/indiewire_inter_52.html |archive-date = February 26, 2008}} Park Chan-wook names The Housemaid as one of the films which most influenced his career, and says of Kim Ki-young, "He is able to find and portray beauty in destruction, humor in violence and terror."{{cite web |url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB113651391693239350|title=Payback Time: Korean king of revenge flicks picks five gritty classics|date=January 6, 2006|access-date=February 7, 2008|last=Yoon|first=Linda|publisher=The Wall Street Journal}}

• List of Korean film directors
• Cinema of Korea

{{reflist}}

• {{cite web|title=김기영의 마술적 리얼리즘을 회상하다 (Recollection on the magic realism of Kim Ki-young)|url=http://www.donga.com/e-county/sssboard/board.php?tcode=03006&s_work=view&no=136&p_page=7&p_choice=&p_item=&p_category=|date=February 17, 2006|access-date=January 28, 2008|publisher=Dong-a nuri / Film.2.0|language=ko|first=Ji-ung|last=Heo|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226214020/http://www.donga.com/e-county/sssboard/board.php?tcode=03006&s_work=view&no=136&p_page=7&p_choice=&p_item=&p_category=|archive-date=February 26, 2008|url-status=dead}}
• {{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Site-Map/Site-Map.htm|title=The House of Kim Ki-young|access-date=January 22, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040327140305/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Site-Map/Site-Map.htm|archive-date=March 27, 2004}} – an extensive page of critical writings
• {{IMDb name|id=0453579|name=Ki-young Kim}}
• {{cite book |editor-last=Kim|editor-first=Hong-joon |title=Korean Film Directors: Kim Ki-young|year=2007|publisher=Seoul Selection|location=Seoul|language=en, ko}}
• {{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/KKYINT1.htm|title=An Interview (with Kim Ki-young) to Mark the Pusan Retrospective|access-date=February 7, 2008|last=Kim|first=Young-jin|author2=Kwon Yong-min |author3=Park Ji-yeon |author4=Lee Sang-yong |publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040508040726/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/KKYINT1.htm|archive-date=May 8, 2004}}
• {{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|title=Biography (Kim Ki-young), Part 1|access-date=January 21, 2008|last=Lee|first=Youn-Yi|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040505192939/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|archive-date=May 5, 2004}}
• {{cite web |url=http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/Bio1.htm|title=Biography (Kim Ki-young), Part 2|access-date=February 7, 2008|last=Lee|first=Youn-Yi|publisher=The House of Kim Ki-young|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040509084520/http://www.asianfilms.org/korea/kky/KKY/Cabinet/bio2.htm|archive-date=May 9, 2004 }}
• {{cite web |first=Chuck|last=Stephens|url=http://www.sfbg.com/AandE/32/36/monster.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20020802151752/http://www.sfbg.com/AandE/32/36/monster.html|date=June 10, 1998|access-date=January 19, 2008|archive-date=August 2, 2002|title=Meet Mr. Monster: A peek inside the cine-crypt of Kim Ki-young|publisher=San Francisco Bay Guardian}}

{{Kim Ki-young}}

{{Blue Dragon Film Award Best Director}}

{{Buil Film Awards for Best Director}}

{{Paeksang Arts Award Best Director Film}}

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Category:1919 births

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Category:Mass media people from Seoul

Category:People from Jongno District

Category:Seoul National University alumni

Category:South Korean film directors

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Category:Accidental deaths in South Korea

Category:Best Director Paeksang Arts Award (film) winners