1961 wurde S?dkoreas Regierung durch einen von General Park Chung Hee gef?hrten Milit?rputsch entmachtet. Danach f?hrte Park das Land 18 Jahre mit eiserner Hand und war wegbereitend f?r Koreas Aufstieg zum modernen Industrieland. Im Oktober 1979 wurde er ermordet. Am fraglichen Tag, machte Park sich einen sch?nen Abend mit Wein, Weib und japanischen Gesang. Mit am Tisch, der Chef des Koreanischen Geheimdienstes Kim, Chefsekret?r Yang und der dicke Bodyguard Cha. Einer davon sollte sich im Verlaufe des Abends dazu entscheiden, den Pr?sidenten zu erschie?en. Sang-Soo Ims Politthriller, hat in S?dkorea heftige Diskussion ausgel?st. Es mussten schlie?lich auf Befehl des Obersten Gerichtshofs insgesamt vier Minuten Archivmaterial am Anfang und Ende des Films entfernt werden. Trotzdem ist der Thriller, teils schwarze Kom?die, ein bis in die Nebenrollen bestens besetztes, hochunterhaltsames St?ck Politfiktion.

Born in 1962 in Seoul, he studied Sociology at Yonsei University. His father was a leading film critic in the 1980s and in 1989 he went on to study film for one year at the Korean film Academy. That same year he worked as assistant director for Park Jongwon's KURO ARIRANG (1989). He then worked as assistant director to the great Korean director Im Kwontaek (Cannes best director CHIHWASEON) for THE GENERAL'S SON I & II.

He made his feature-debut as writer-director in 1998 with GIRLS NIGHT OUT, the story of 3 single women and their active sex lives. His next film, TEARS, which he also wrote, told the hard story of misfit and wayward Korean youth. His third film, A GOOD LAWYER?S WIFE which threw a punch at Korean society with its biting depiction of a disintegrating upper middle class family was not only embraced by the Korean public but also earned the film international acclaim especially through its selection in competition for the Venice Film Festival in 2003.

His forthright critique of Korea?s mainstream society and its rules and values has truly established him as perhaps the most controversial Korean filmmaker who challenges the norm. In his most recent feature project, THE PRESIDENT?S LAST BANG, he succeeds in giving a cinematically outstanding and mature approach to one of the most shocking incidents in modern Korean history.