Bong Joon-ho names the 10 greatest movies of all time
When it comes to the current landscape of world cinema, very few filmmakers have the same international stature as South Korean filmmaker Bong Joon-ho. Known for his layered thrillers such as Memories of Murder and the Oscar-winning Parasite, Bong Joon-ho has developed a strong global following and directors like Quentin Tarantino have championed his work.
After the unprecedented success of Parasite, Bong commenced work on an upcoming sci-fi film starring Robert Pattinson called Mickey 17. While you are waiting for his next project, which is going to be released in 2024, it would be a great idea to revisit some of Bong’s favourite films in order to understand his unique sensibilities.
For the recent edition of the Sight and Sound poll, Bong submitted his list of the greatest movies ever made and put Alfred Hitchcock’s seminal thriller Psycho at the top. In an interview with Vanity Fair, he revealed that he was influenced by Hitchcock while making Parasite. Bong said: “He always gives me very strange inspiration. I rewatched Psycho because the Bates house, not the motel, it had a very interesting structure.”
Martin Scorsese has also been a longtime favourite of Bong’s, and he considers Raging Bull to be Scorsese’s best work. The director once said: “Many people can say in the movie there is amazing camerawork, editing, and beautiful black-and-white cinematography, but for me, it is a very unique portrait of one man. From one perspective, he’s a disgusting person. He’s contradictory and problematic. It’s a portrait of human complexities and weakness. I think it’s the most honest portrayal of the conflicts and complexities of one man.”
Bong also included The Housemaid, one of the first South Korean films that had a huge impact on his journey as a director. He described the film as “a crime melodrama inspired by an actual event Kim read in a newspaper. It’s a crime melodrama that deals with women’s sexual desires and Korean society at the time, and the changing social classes. It does a great job depicting that.”
Check out the full list below.
Bong Joon-ho’s 10 favourite movies:
- Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)
- The Housemaid (Kim Ki-young, 1960)
- Rocco and His Brothers (Luchino Visconti, 1960)
- Vengeance is Mine (Shōhei Imamura, 1979)
- Raging Bull (Martin Scorsese, 1980)
- A City of Sadness (Hou Hsiao-Hsien, 1989)
- Cure (Kiyoshi Kurosawa, 1997)
- Zodiac (David Fincher, 2007)
- Mad Max: Fury Road (George Miller, 2015)
- Happy as Lazzaro (Alice Rohrwacher, 2018)
The list contains three films from 1960, indicating that the beginning of the decade might have been Bong’s favourite cinematic year. However, the Parasite director also included modern picks such as David Fincher’s Zodiac and George Miller’s Fury Road.
While talking about Zodiac, Bong gushed: “It has a slow tempo and a very realistic mood. I’m amazed at how Fincher can control the pace of his films so well, which creates a sense of suspense in serene fashion. You experience a sense of anxiety but also suspense with sensitivity and stillness.”
