Peppermint Candy

After Yeong-ho’s suicide, the chronology moves backward: across six chapters, Peppermint Candy blends collective memory and psychoanalysis, through pivotal episodes in South Korea’s modern history. The past unfolds gradually, piecing together the portrait of a man shaped by his country’s profound and turbulent changes.

Digitally restored copy

Duration: 129’
Production year: 1999
Country: KR, JP
Language: KO Subtitles: PT, EN

Upcoming sessions

14:00

Culturgest

Small Auditorium

Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 2000 – Special Prize of the Jury, Don Quijote Award, Special Mention: Netpac Award
Cannes Film Festival 2000

Lee Chang-dong

Born in Daegu in 1954, Lee Chang-dong is one of the most acclaimed South Korean filmmakers and novelists. After beginning his literary career in 1983, he turned to cinema in his forties, working first as a screenwriter and assistant director before making his directorial debut with Green Fish (1997). He went on to direct Peppermint Candy (1999), Oasis (2002), Secret Sunshine (2007), Poetry (2010) and Burning (2018), earning international acclaim and major awards. Oasis won the Silver Lion for Best Director at Venice Film Festival, while Secret Sunshine received the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival for Jeon Do-yeon. From 2003 to 2004, Lee Chang-dong served as South Korea’s Minister of Culture and Tourism. His films explore isolation, desire, grief and social inequality through deeply compassionate portraits of individuals caught in moments of personal and historical upheaval. After an eight-year hiatus, he returned to cinema with Possible Love (2026), presented in Competition at Venice, where it received the Grand Jury Prize.