‘Parasite’ Actor’s Death Prompts Criticism of Police, Media

 Mourners carrying a coffin and portrait of South Korean actor Lee Sun-kyun leave after his funeral in Seoul, South Korea, December 29, 2023. (Reuters)
Mourners carrying a coffin and portrait of South Korean actor Lee Sun-kyun leave after his funeral in Seoul, South Korea, December 29, 2023. (Reuters)
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‘Parasite’ Actor’s Death Prompts Criticism of Police, Media

 Mourners carrying a coffin and portrait of South Korean actor Lee Sun-kyun leave after his funeral in Seoul, South Korea, December 29, 2023. (Reuters)
Mourners carrying a coffin and portrait of South Korean actor Lee Sun-kyun leave after his funeral in Seoul, South Korea, December 29, 2023. (Reuters)

As late South Korean actor Lee Sun-kyun's family and friends gather to mourn his death, public criticism of police and media conduct during his investigation for suspected drug use is growing.

Lee, best known globally for his starring role in the Oscar-winning film "Parasite", was found dead inside a car in Seoul this week, with media reporting he left a note "that reads like a will".

Lee's reputation had suffered a significant blow when South Korean authorities launched an investigation into his alleged drug use in October.

The celebrity was dropped from television, film and commercial projects, incurring damages media reports estimated at up to 10 billion won ($7.8 million).

Police were accused of leaking confidential investigation details to the press, fanning malicious coverage and fueling the spread of unverified content online.

Lee's death has prompted public criticism of the media and police, who questioned him for 19 hours a few days before his death.

"There was no need to name the suspect in the investigation", Vladimir Tikhonov, professor of Korea studies at the University of Oslo, told AFP.

"In South Korea -- to a much larger degree than in any European country with higher degrees of tolerance for the use of psychotropic stuffs -- being named as a suspect in a drug investigation is a punishment per se, by social ostracism."

Yu Hyun-jae, a communications professor at Sogang University, told a local broadcaster that Lee's case can be considered a "social murder", with the media, police, and the public sharing responsibility.

Incheon Metropolitan Police chief Kim Hui-jung defended the "entire investigation process", which he said was conducted "in compliance with legal procedures".

"There was no leakage (to media) of investigation details as raised by some," he told reporters Thursday.

South Korea has tough laws on illegal drugs, with President Yoon Suk Yeol declaring a "war on drugs" after taking office last year.

Grief and goodbyes

A private ceremony for the actor was held at the Seoul National University Hospital on Friday, after which his body was taken to a crematorium.

The ceremony was attended by his wife and fellow actor Jeon Hye-jin, his two sons, and many of the actor's colleagues, including Gong Hyo-jin, Ryu Seung-ryong and Lee Sung-min.

"Parasite" director Bong Joon-ho and co-stars Park So-dam and Park Myung-hoon visited the funeral home on Thursday, as did acclaimed auteur Park Chan-wook and actors Jung Woo-sung and Lee Jung-jae.

Grieving fans stuck handwritten notes to the front of the hospital.

One wrote: "Thank you for being Lee Sun-kyun.

"The works you have created with your efforts and sincerity have saved countless people."

"We're sorry we couldn't do anything for you when you were having a hard time," the note said.

A series of entertainment industry events in South Korea were cancelled so that people could pay condolences to the late actor.

Gangnam in focus

Seoul's Gangnam district -- known for expensive apartments, high-end bars, clubs and a cluster of plastic surgery clinics -- has been at the center of a series of high-profile drug scandals.

Lee had been suspected of using illicit drugs at the residence of a hostess employed at a high-end bar in the glamorous district.

The late actor had denied knowingly taking the drugs, saying he was "tricked" into doing so by the hostess, against whom he had filed a complaint for blackmail and extortion, according to South Korea's Yonhap news agency.

Lee had tested negative for drugs twice, once during police investigations and again in a lab last month, Yonhap reported.

Police said Friday they had transferred a plastic surgeon, who operates a clinic in Gangnam, to the prosecution for the alleged illegal supply of drugs to the bar hostess.

Among the drugs that Lee allegedly took was ketamine, which was involved in a 2018 date-rape scandal at Gangnam's Burning Sun nightclub, then run by the now-disgraced and convicted K-pop star Seungri.

This year, a man was sentenced to life in prison for orchestrating a kidnapping and murder that involved ketamine also illicitly obtained from a plastic surgery clinic in Gangnam.



Movie Review: From Bumper to Bumper, ‘F1’ Is Formula One Spectacle 

Brad Pitt, from left, Lewis Hamilton, and Damson Idris attend the world premiere of "F1 The Movie" on Monday, June 16, 2025, in Times Square in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
Brad Pitt, from left, Lewis Hamilton, and Damson Idris attend the world premiere of "F1 The Movie" on Monday, June 16, 2025, in Times Square in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
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Movie Review: From Bumper to Bumper, ‘F1’ Is Formula One Spectacle 

Brad Pitt, from left, Lewis Hamilton, and Damson Idris attend the world premiere of "F1 The Movie" on Monday, June 16, 2025, in Times Square in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)
Brad Pitt, from left, Lewis Hamilton, and Damson Idris attend the world premiere of "F1 The Movie" on Monday, June 16, 2025, in Times Square in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

The wide-screen spectacle of Formula One gets a gleaming, rip-roaring workout in Joseph Kosinski’s “F1,” a fine-tuned machine of a movie that, in its most riveting racing scenes, approaches a kind of high-speed splendor.

Kosinski, who last endeavored to put moviegoers in the seat of a fighter jet in “Top Gun: Maverick,” has moved to the open cockpits of Formula One with much the same affection, if not outright need, for speed. A lot of the same team is back. Jerry Bruckheimer produces. Ehren Kruger, a co-writer on “Maverick,” takes sole credit here. Hans Zimmer, a co-composer previously, supplies the thumping score.

And, again, our central figure is an older, high-flying cowboy plucked down in an ultramodern, gas-guzzling conveyance to teach a younger generation about old-school ingenuity and, maybe, the enduring appeal of denim.

But whereas Tom Cruise is a particularly forward-moving action star, Brad Pitt, who stars as the driving-addicted Sonny Hayes in “F1,” has always been a more arrestingly poised presence. Think of the way he so calmly and half-interestedly faces off with Bruce Lee in Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time ... in Hollywood.” In the opening scene of “F1,” he’s sleeping in a van with headphones on when someone rouses him. He splashes some water on his face and walks a few steps over to the Daytona oval, where he quickly enters his team’s car, in the midst of a 24-hour race. Pitt goes from zero to 180 mph in a minute.

Sonny, a long-ago phenom who crashed out of Formula One decades earlier and has since been racing any vehicle, even a taxi, he can get behind the wheel of, is approached by an old friend, Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem) about joining his flagging F1 team, APX. Sonny turns him down at first but, of course, he joins and “F1” is off to the races.

The title sequence, exquisitely timed to the syncopated rhythms of Zimmer’s score, is a blistering introduction. The hotshot rookie driver Noah Pearce (Damson Idris) is just running a practice lap, but Kosinski, his camera adeptly moving in and out of the cockpit, uses the moment to plunge us into the high-tech world of Formula One, where every inch of the car is connected to digital sensors monitored by a watchful team. Here, that includes technical director Kate McKenna (Kerry Condon) and Kaspar Molinski (Kim Bodnia), the team’s chief.

Verisimilitude is of obvious importance to the filmmakers, who bathe this very Formula One-authorized film in all the sleek operations and globe-trotting spectacle of the sport. That Apple, which produced the film, would even go for such a high-priced summer movie about Formula One is a testament to the upswing in popularity of a sport once quite niche in America, and of the halo effects of both the Netflix series “Formula 1: Drive to Survive” and the seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton, an executive producer on “F1.”

Whether “F1” pleases diehards, I’ll leave to more ardent followers of the circuit. But what I can say definitively is that Claudio Miranda knows how to shoot it. The cinematographer, who has shot all of Kosinski’s films as well as wonders like Ang Lee’s “Life of Pi,” brings Formula One to vivid, visceral life. When “F1” heads to the big races, Miranda is always simultaneously capturing the zooming cars from the asphalt while backgrounding it with the sweeping spectacle of a course like the UK’s fabled Silverstone Circuit.

OK, you might be thinking, so the racing is good; is there a story? There’s what I’d call enough of one, though you might have to go to the photo finish to verify that. When Sonny shows up, and rapidly turns one practice vehicle into toast, it’s clear that he’s going to be an agent of chaos at APX, a low-ranking team that’s in heavy debt and struggling to find a car that performs.

This gives Pitt a fine opportunity to flash his charisma, playing Sonny as an obsessive who refuses any trophy and has no real interest in money, either. The flashier, media-ready Noah watches Sonny's arrival with skepticism, and the two begin more as rivals than teammates. Idris is up to the mano-a-mano challenge, but he’s limited by a role ultimately revolving around and reducing to a young Black man learning a lesson in work ethic.

A relationship does develop, but “F1” struggles to get its characters out of the starting blocks, keeping them closer to the cliches they start out as. The actor who, more than anyone, keeps the momentum going is Condon, playing an aerodynamics specialist whose connection with Pitt’s Sonny is immediate. Just as she did in between another pair of headstrong men in “The Banshees of Inisherin,” Condon is a rush of naturalism.

If there’s something preventing “F1” from hitting full speed, it’s its insistence on having its characters constantly voice Sonny’s motivations. The same holds true on the race course, where broadcast commentary narrates virtually every moment of the drama. That may be a necessity for a sport where the crucial strategies of hot tires and pit-stop timing aren't quite household concepts. But the best car race movies — from “Grand Prix” to “Senna” to “Ferrari” — know when to rely on nothing but the roar of an engine.

“F1” steers predictably to the finish line, cribbing here and there from sports dramas before it. (Tobias Menzies plays a board member with uncertain corporate goals.) When “F1” does, finally, quiet down, for one blissful moment, the movie, almost literally, soars. It's not quite enough to forget all the high-octane macho dramatics before it, but it's enough to glimpse another road “F1” might have taken.