Speaking of Hong Sangsoo—he was always a man with many contradiction.
It wasn't that he lacked talent as a filmmaker; in fact, his name was already etched among the distinctive auteurs of Korean cinema.
But outside of his cinematic craft, his social and personal life was… complicated. To call him a "romantic" would be far too gentle.
The truth was closer to scandalous, especially when measured against the values of the society he came from.
If one were to capture Hong Sangsoo's life in a single story, 'The Bridges of Madison County' would be the closest comparison: a tale of love and longing, but also of moral conflict.
His long-term affair with a much younger actress was not just a tabloid headline; it became a cultural flashpoint.
In the West, perhaps such behavior could be dismissed, tolerated, or even normalized. Affairs and unconventional relationships often existed in public without sinking reputations.
But in the East, especially in Korea, such an act clashed violently with deeply rooted expectations about love, marriage, and fidelity.
The cultural difference mattered.
One had to understand the divide.
Western culture leaned toward open-mindedness, toward individuality and freedom in matters of the heart.
Eastern culture, by contrast, carried centuries of Confucian conservatism.
Relationships and marriage were not merely personal; they were social contracts bound by duty, family, and reputation.
So when Hong Sangsoo—a married man—was revealed to be having an affair with a woman twenty-two years younger than him, the public outrage was inevitable.
The scandal was not just about romance. It was about betrayal.
When the affair came to light, Sangsoo was still legally married. His divorce would not be finalized until 2019, meaning that for years, his personal and professional life remained mired in tension.
Yet, curiously, none of this erased his artistic identity.
For all the controversy, Hong Sangsoo developed one of the most distinctive, idiosyncratic signatures in contemporary cinema.
Fans even coined a term for it: 'Hong-ish.'
To watch one of his films was to step into a world of quiet conversations, awkward silences, and sudden shifts in perspective.
His style often appeared loose, improvised, almost careless—but beneath the surface lay deliberate, carefully crafted techniques.
One of his trademarks was the use of repetition with subtle, almost invisible variation.
In his 2015 film 'Right Now, Wrong Then', he structured the story in two parts.
The same characters met under the same circumstances, but in the first version their encounter unfolded clumsily, ending in awkward failure.
In the second version, tiny shifts in dialogue and behavior led to a warmer, more considerate outcome.
It was simple, yet profound. Small changes created entirely different emotional truths.
This device of repetition and contrast wasn't unique to him—it was deeply rooted in Korean storytelling, especially in dramas.
One might recall countless K-dramas where the male lead and female lead meet twice: the first meeting bristling with tension or misunderstanding, the second softening into empathy and attraction.
It was, in such essence of a soap-opera formula. But Sangsoo reframed this formula under a sharper lens, stripping away melodrama and turning the repetition into quiet philosophical study.
Another of his hallmarks was his peculiar use of zoom.
Sangsoo would often rely on the camera's slow, digital-like zoom to heighten emotion or reframe a moment.
A shot might linger on a character's face during introspection, or pull back to reestablish distance between people, creating a sense of casual observation.
It was as though the camera itself were breathing, listening, reacting to the characters.
This stripped-down aesthetic gave his films a diary-like intimacy, as if the audience were eavesdropping on private lives rather than watching a constructed narrative.
But for all the charm of his style, there was a ceiling.
Sangsoo's films were relentlessly slow-paced, deliberately mundane, and almost always centered on love or relationships.
His obsession with these themes limited his exploration of broader subjects.
He became, in many ways, a chronicler of ordinary romance and disappointment—a "love storyteller" more than a versatile filmmaker.
This limitation showed in his recognition on the global stage.
While he found consistent success in film festivals, particularly in categories outside the main competition, his work rarely broke into the highest tiers of acclaim.
Even when he won at Cannes in 2010, it was in the Un Certain Regard section, not the main competition.
His style, while respected, boxed him in.
And Jihoon, sitting across from him now in Cannes, understood all of this.
It was 2008, and Jihoon knew the landscape of this festival more intimately than most.
He knew, with a certainty born from both instinct and memory, that Hong Sangsoo would walk away from this year's Cannes as little more than a passerby.
His film, though noted, was not the one that would define Korea this year.
Instead, the spotlight belonged to Lee Changdong's 'Secret Sunshine'.
Changdong, unlike Sangsoo, had the depth and range that captured juries.
His film's narrative weight, its exploration of grief and faith, and above all, Jeon Doyeon's powerhouse performance would seize Cannes' attention.
Jihoon already knew how this story would unfold: Jeon would win the Best Actress award, a monumental achievement for Korean cinema, and the first korean actress to be awarded in such international accolades.
It would be a triumph not only for Lee Changdong, but for Korea itself—a signal that the country's film industry was no longer just a regional powerhouse, but an emerging global force.
For Jihoon, this was an ironic twist of fate.
Though he was Korean, the film he had brought to Cannes—Buried—was not competing under Korea's name.
It had been shot in the United States, with an American cast, financed and packaged through American channels. According to the festival's rules, it was categorized as an American film.
And so, while Jihoon stood as a Korean director at heart, the laurels of his success would not be counted as a Korean victory. They would belong to America.
The irony was not lost on him.
After a brief exchange of pleasantries with the group, Jihoon shifted his attention to Sangsoo. He had been patient long enough, but patience was not his strongest virtue in moments like this.
What he hated most in Korea was this habit people had of circling around their true intentions—layering conversations with tangents, anecdotes, even grandmotherly parables—before finally arriving at the point.
It felt exhausting compared to America, where people were blunt, direct, sometimes even abrasive, but at least you always knew where you stood.
This meandering style grated on Jihoon.
For the past several minutes, he had listened to chatter that danced around the edges of the subject, without even brushing the heart of it. Not a single sentence had touched on why they were really here.
Finally, deciding he'd had enough, Jihoon leaned back slightly and broke the stalemate.
"Sangsoo-hyung," he said in a casual tone that carried just enough weight to push the conversation forward, "so what brought you guys here?"
It was phrased as a light question, but Jihoon's emphasis was deliberate. He was no longer in the mood for circles—he wanted the truth, and he wanted it now.