SEOUL – South Korean actress Kim Go-eun won her first Best Actress award at the 60th Baeksang Arts Awards held in Seoul on May 7, while South Korean actor Hwang Jung-min nabbed the Best Actor prize after missing out on it several times.
Recognising excellence in film, television and theatre in South Korea, Baeksang is one of the three most prestigious award ceremonies in the country, alongside the Daejong Film Awards and Blue Dragon Film Awards. The 2024 show was hosted by comedian Shin Dong-yup, singer-actress Bae Suzy and actor Park Bo-gum.
Kim, 32, won in the film category for her role as shaman Hwa-rim in the occult thriller Exhuma, which also starred Choi Min-sik, Yoo Hae-jin and Lee Do-hyun.
Exhuma director Jang Jae-hyun won Best Director while Lee, 29, who played Hwa-rim’s protege, won Best New Actor.
Hwang, 53, won Best Actor for his role as head of the Defence Security Command Chun Doo-gwang in the film 12.12: The Day. The historical drama, whose Korean title is Spring In Seoul, is based on the military coup of Dec 12, 1979, which brought former president Chun Doo-hwan to power.
Hwang had been dubbed the “Leonardo DiCaprio of Baeksang” for a long streak of missing out on the top honour, despite a versatile acting career spanning 33 years.
Hollywood star DiCaprio, 49, won his first Best Actor Oscar in 2016 for the film The Revenant after being nominated three times previously in his three decades in show business.
12.12: The Day, the highest-grossing film in South Korea in 2023, also won Best Film and the Grand Prize in the film category at Baeksang.
Kim Hyeong-seo, widely known as the singer Bibi, won Best New Actress for her role in the action noir film Hopeless, which also starred actor Song Joong-ki. The movie was invited to the Cannes Film Festival’s non-competitive Un Certain Regard section in 2023.
The Best Screenplay award in the film category went to first-time director Jason Yu of mystery thriller Sleep, another Cannes participant, which starred actress Jung Yu-mi and late actor Lee Sun-kyun.
The awards for Best Supporting roles in the film category went to veteran actor Kim Jong-soo for crime action flick Smugglers and actress Lee Sang-hee of Netflix’s My Name Is Loh Kiwan.
In the television category, Disney+ action-fantasy series Moving clinched the Grand Prize. The show’s screenwriter Kang Full, who also created the original Moving webtoon, won Best Screenplay.
Director Han Dong-wook, who helmed crime series The Worst Of Evil, won Best Director, while South Korean local broadcaster MBC’s period romance drama My Dearest was named Best Drama, with its male lead Namkoong Min snagging Best Actor.
The Best Actress award in the TV category went to Honey Lee, who returned to the small screen six months after giving birth to play a Joseon-era masked heroine in MBC’s period drama Knight Flower.
Kim Soo-hyun and K-pop girl group IVE’s Yujin were named Most Popular Actor and Most Popular Actress respectively. THE KOREA HERALD/ASIA NEWS NETWORK
