page_title: Cinema of South Korea
section_title: Golden age (1955-1972)
hierarchical_section_title: Cinema of South Korea / History / Golden age (1955-1972)
caption_attribution_description: English: Theatrical poster of the South Korean film The Housemaid (1960).
context_page_description: The cinema of South Korea refers to the film industry of South Korea from 1945 to present. South Korean films have been heavily influenced by such events and forces as the Japanese occupation of Korea, the Korean War, government censorship, the business sector, globalization, and the democratization of South Korea. Chungmu is frequently used as a metonym for the industry.
  The golden age of South Korean cinema in the mid-20th century produced what are considered two of the best South Korean films of all time, The Housemaid and Obaltan, while the industry's revival with the Korean New Wave from the late 1990s to the present produced both of the country's highest-grossing films, The Admiral: Roaring Currents and Extreme Job, as well as prize winners on the festival circuit including Golden Lion recipient Pietà and Palme d'Or recipient and Academy Award winner Parasite and international cult classics including Oldboy, Snowpiercer, and Train to Busan.
context_section_description: Though filmmakers were still subject to government censorship, South Korea experienced a golden age of cinema, mostly consisting of melodramas, starting in the mid-1950s. The number of films made in South Korea increased from only 15 in 1954 to 111 in 1959.
  One of the most popular films of the era, director Lee Kyu-hwan's now lost remake of Chunhyang-jeon (1955), drew 10 percent of Seoul's population to movie theaters However, while Chunhyang-jeon re-told a traditional Korean story, another popular film of the era, Han Hyung-mo's Madame Freedom (1956), told a modern story about female sexuality and Western values.
  South Korean filmmakers enjoyed a brief freedom from censorship in the early 1960s, between the administrations of Syngman Rhee and Park Chung-hee. Kim Ki-young's The Housemaid (1960) and Yu Hyun-mok's Obaltan (1961), now considered among the best South Korean films ever made, were produced during this time. Kang Dae-jin's The Coachman (1961) became the first South Korean film to win an award at an international film festival when it took home the Silver Bear Jury Prize at the 1961 Berlin International Film Festival.
  When Park Chung-hee became acting president in 1962, government control over the film industry increased substantially. Under the Motion Picture Law of 1962, a series of increasingly restrictive measures was enacted that limited imported films under a quota system. The new regulations also reduced the number of domestic film-production companies from 71 to 16 within a year. Government censorship targeted obscenity, communism, and unpatriotic themes in films.
  Nonetheless, the Motion Picture Law's limit on imported films resulted in a boom of domestic films. South Korean filmmakers had to work quickly to meet public demand, and many films were shot in only a few weeks. During the 1960s, the most popular South Korean filmmakers released six to eight films per year. Notably, director Kim Soo-yong released ten films in 1967, including Mist, which is considered to be his greatest work.
  In 1967, South Korea's first animated feature film, Hong Kil-dong, was released. A handful of animated films followed including Golden Iron Man (1968), South Korea's first science-fiction animated film.
caption: Poster for The Housemaid (1960)
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