Youn Yuh Jung

Youn Yuh-Jung was born in Kaesong, in the South Korean province of Gyeonggi, in 1947. His father died at an early age, so he grew up surrounded by women, his mother and two sisters, with whom he moved to Seoul. He studied Korean language and literature at Hanyang University, but already in 1966 he appeared for an acting casting, and the following year he had a presence in the television drama Mister Gong. In any case, the year of her acting breakthrough was 1971, in a role of a femme fatale in Woman on Fire , a film that was part of the so-called “maiden trilogy” by Kim Ki-Young, and which won her the award for the best actress at the Sitges Festival. Ki-Young himself directed her again the following year in The Insect Woman.. Much later Yuh-Yung admitted what great roles she had, and that she little recognized that she had worked with a great director.

The roles of a soulless villain suited her well, having also excelled as a conniving courtesan in the historical drama Jang Hui-bin . The specialists and the public were satisfied because her interpretive style was not the prevailing one, but her characters were complex and introspective.

And at this point love appeared, he met the singer Jo Young-nam and they both married in 1975 and emigrated to the United States. There was a hiatus in her acting career, at which time she had her two children. Unfortunately the marriage broke up, she returned to Korea in 1984 and three years later the divorce was consummated. The good news was that he resumed his acting career, and managed to overcome the difficulties imaginable in someone who has been out of the scene for a decade, and who is now close to 40. Of course, with patience and tenacity it was not easy, the first step had the significant title of Mother (1985) the role that had assumed in the real world in the years of absence.

From 1995 he did not stop working as soon as he resumed his career. There are to prove it the television series in which she played a matriarch Men of the Bath House (1995), Be Strong Geum Soon (2005), Daughters-in-Law (2007), My Husband Got a Family (2012) and Dear My Friends (2016). While on film she did A Good Lawyer’s Wife (2003), where she was the wife of a dysfunctional family, the satirical black comedy about the conspiracy to kill the president The President’s Last Bang (2005) and The Taste of Money .(2012), a thriller about the ambition in the business world of a clan. They are titles that demonstrated his variety of acting registers, the same was used for drama as for comedy, or a combination of both.

The “matrixian” Wachowski sisters took notice of her and recruited her to Sense8 , where she had a small role. In any case, it is clear that there is a before and after with Minari. Historia de mi familia , where her role as a foul-mouthed grandmother recently arrived from Korea to help her daughter, her son-in-law and her grandchildren, living on a farm in the United States, has given her awards , nominations and great satisfaction. She says that “when I read the script, she struck a chord with me, it was very authentic.” To compose her role, she remembered her own grandmother, and how she behaved with her when she was a child: “How stupid and ignorant I was, I didn’t realize her sacrifice and dedication.”

Although nominated for an Oscar for Supporting Actress, hers is a first-rate role without a doubt, as her Soonja undoubtedly becomes the unexpected backbone of the family, both when she is in the best of health and when life’s inevitable ailments strike. diminishes in it The actress assures joking that when a friend gave her the news that she was nominated for an Oscar, it was the other one who was moved and began to cry, not her, who nevertheless confesses to being very proud of this unexpected distinction for a film by which is delighted.