Latest news with #Yeon
San Francisco Chronicle
14-05-2025
- San Francisco Chronicle
I've eaten at Korean restaurants all over California. This sizzling rice bowl is the best one I've tried
I like bibimbap. But I adore its dashing sibling: dolsot bibimbap. Prepared in a scorching hot stone pot, it improves on the classic Korean rice and veggie dish by giving rice the top billing. The grains slowly sear in oil against scalding rock, yielding a magical crust and unlocking flavors absent in a typical bibimbap. This is the culinary tradition known as scorched rice, where the grains are intentionally cooked until toasted but not yet burnt — though some cuisines openly welcome char. It's a risky technique but produces vivid aroma in dishes like Persian tahdig, Vietnamese com cháy and Puerto Rican arroz con grandules, whose prized bottom layer is called pegao. Recently, I found my ideal dolsot bibimbap at Vivid Bibim, a new Korean restaurant in San Leandro. Run by brothers Yeon and Jun Choi, the casual restaurant has a long menu of stews and shareable platters, but the stone pot bibimbap outshines everything else. There is $2 to $5 upcharge from the standard version — a small price to pay for greatness. The dolsot arrives at the table sizzling furiously. Close your eyes and it sounds like popping corn, and it tastes like it too. Clinging to the stone walls with the force of a powerful magnet, the crisped rice tastes nutty and faintly bittersweet. But the best part is its chewy, shatteringly crunchy texture. Its distinctive crackle is owed to its blend of white and black glutinous rice, whose runoff color dyes the former lavender. Equally eye-catching is a halo of vegetables — 10 different kinds — like mushrooms, carrots, radishes and bean sprouts, which encircle a fried egg and the meat (or tofu) of your choice. Beef is the most popular, but my highest marks go to the seafood mix ($24.95), bouncy shrimp and calamari in a spicy-sweet sauce. While the price tag for a seemingly simple rice dish may seem high, the value lies in its portion — one order could easily feed two. The staff instructs you to season the bibimbap with a spiral of gochujang, the thick pepper paste in red squeeze bottles, and mix it all together — ensuring to scrape the pot walls to liberate every stuck grain. However, I like to wait a little longer, allowing the rice armor to fortify, before mixing. When all of the elements are fully integrated, try to get a spoonful of every component; an ideal bite has freshness from veggies, crunch from the scorched rice, spice from gochujang and richness from meat. Accompany it with a line of splendid banchan — eight repositories of crunch, funk and spice — like julienned potato salad, which I prefer over the more common sweet version, and nutty kale salad with delicate smokiness. Vivid Bibim opened in January, replacing JP Seoul Tofu House in a strip mall. Jun runs the business side of things and Yeon, who has over 30 years of restaurant experience, is the chef. The full-service Korean restaurant is slowly finding its audience through word of mouth. It has an inviting vibe with gracious hospitality; staff offer advice — like the best mixing practices for the bibimbap, for example — and routinely replenish side dishes. The brothers hope to create an environment closer to a bapjip, a place that serves meals with 'the comfort and care of eating at home,' said Jun. To make the dish, Yeon heats the dolsot directly over flame. Then he adds sesame oil followed by multi-grain rice, which sears for up to 10 minutes to form its indomitable rice phalanx. Yeon relies on sound, smell and intuition to gauge when it's ready. For the brothers, the dish sparks memories of eating with their neighbors in Korea. 'It has everything I would want and need in a meal,' Jun said. 'I never get sick of (it).' Me neither. Vivid Bibim. Noon-8 p.m. Thursday-Sunday. 14393 Washington Ave., Suite J, San Leandro. or 510-878-1338
South China Morning Post
05-04-2025
- Entertainment
- South China Morning Post
In Netflix's Weak Hero Class 2, Lee Jun-young plays Park Ji-hoon's rival at a new school
Netflix released the official poster and trailer this week for its coming series Weak Hero Class 2, the sequel to the 2022 hit Weak Hero Class 1. Advertisement The new season follows Yeon Si-eun, a model student who transfers to Eunjang High School burdened by trauma after failing to protect a friend from violence. Determined never to lose another friend, he finds himself standing against even greater violence. Portrayed by Park Ji-hoon, Yeon faces off against a mysterious new rival, Geum Seong-jae, played by Lee Jun-young. In the trailer, Yeon says remorsefully, 'Su-ho, I got into another fight. I'm sorry,' hinting at the unresolved scars from his past. Having lost his smile and become a self-imposed outsider, Yeon struggles to stay unnoticed, but disturbing rumours soon target him. New characters Park Hu-min ( Ryeoun ), Seo Jun-tae (Choi Min-young), and Go Hyun-tak (Lee Min-jae) approach him with kindness, telling him to ignore the gossip. Though he initially shuts the others out, Yeon slowly lowers his guard and accepts their friendship.
Korea Herald
25-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Interview: Yeon Sang-ho reckons with divine delusions in 'Revelations'
'Train to Busan' filmmaker blends genre potboiler with meditation on faith, streamed straight into age of curated reality "I'm a total product of the '90s—back when I was binging films like crazy and had this whole dream of becoming a director one day," Yeon Sang-ho tells a group of reporters Monday at a hotel in Yeouido, Seoul. "I'm still big on that whole auteur thing, the director's intent and all that." The filmmaker, 46, speaks with the calm certainty of someone who knows exactly what every frame means. He dissects scenes with surgical precision, diving into technical choices with the kind of seriousness that makes it clear nothing was left to chance. His latest film, "Revelations," which dropped on Netflix Friday, wears its symbolism loudly and proudly — from angel-shaped clouds to a lightning-scorched rock that reveals the face of Jesus. And yet, the director hopes it doesn't hit viewers too fast. 'I wanted all those details to be hiding in plain sight — obvious, but only if you're really looking.' "Revelations" follows Pastor Sung Min-chan (Ryu Jun-yeol), who believes he's been divinely chosen to punish the culprit behind a churchgoer's disappearance. Alongside him is Yeon-hui (Shin Hyun-been), a detective investigating the same case while grappling with visions of her dead sister. Kwon Yang-rae, played by Shin Min-jae, is an ex-con whose possible guilt is the film's central pivot. The film attempts to juggle, at times rather heavy-handedly, the social critique seen in Yeon's earlier works like "The Fake" and "Hellbound," with the slow-burn suspense of a mystery thriller. Ryu brings feverish conviction to Sung, who delivers sermons beneath a glowing red neon crucifix in a crumbling suburban church. When a young girl vanishes and his pursuit of a suspect spirals into violence, Sung starts to interpret every wild twist as divine will — reshaping any number of sins to satisfy his deranged sense of justice and truth. "We're stuck in this era where people only tune into what they want to see and buy into whatever they feel like believing," Yeon explains. "This whole thing is only picking up steam in our society. It's baked into human nature, sure, but now it's getting more extreme. "Back in the day, you'd turn on the TV and just roll with whatever was playing, even if you were not really into it. But now, with everything getting more high-tech, this human instinct to cherry-pick only what we want to see is just getting stronger and stronger." There's a certain irony in hearing this critique from the poster child of Netflix, a platform that practically turbocharges that very bias with its never-ending buffet of like-minded content. But far removed from such algorithm-driven ecosystems, Yeon began his career with independent animated features like "The King of Pigs" (2011) and "The Fake" (2013), before shifting to live-action with the zombie breakout "Train to Busan" (2016). Only in recent years has he built a close creative partnership with the streaming juggernaut, helming series like "Hellbound" and "Parasyte: The Grey." "The distribution model (of Netflix) is entirely different," he says. "This subscription approach operates on completely different principles than the theater system. And the fact that content releases worldwide simultaneously opens up possibilities that weren't available before." When asked about "Revelations," Yeon suggests it swims against the current of typical Netflix fare — at times deliberately slower, more ambiguous, and less eager to hand the audience easy answers. "Looking at what's happening internally in this film, it's not entertainment in the way audiences typically expect. "Paradoxically, I think that's why a service like Netflix can be useful — it can connect with viewers who might never encounter this type of work otherwise." The film serves up visual flourishes that occasionally fall flat. Yeon-hui's ghostly encounters with her sister are portrayed through shaky, disorienting camerawork that leans into B-grade horror territory — stylistically out-of-place in a film that otherwise strives for a gritty, grounded tone. When asked about the choice, Yeon offers a defense. "Ghost scenes are particularly challenging to nail down," he says. "Since Pastor Sung Min-chan gets hit with these in-your-face visual hallucinations, I figured Yeon-hui's guilt should also jump off the screen somehow. When you have an actor fleshing that out, I thought viewers could really get inside Yeon-hui's head and feel what she's going through." Critics have often pegged Yeon's works as taking shots at organized religion, but the director pushes back against that label. "Religion makes an excellent subject matter because, at its core, it's all about faith. From a cultural angle, it serves up exactly the kind of rich material I'm after. But if you're asking if this film is some kind of hit piece on Protestantism, I'd say not at all." He points to a scene near the film's denouement where Yeon-hui rescues a kidnapped girl, cradling her in a composition that immediately invokes sacred art. 'That whole setup is a straight-up nod to Michelangelo's 'Pieta'— I was actually worried it might come off as too religious,' he says. 'If you really follow Yeon-hui's arc, those are the honest-to-God revelations and redemption moments. Her storyline is full of these divine signals, even if they're easy to miss. In that sense, it's actually a pretty Christian film.' With "Revelations," Yeon hopes to provide a distillation of his artistic vision — a sort of Reader's Digest to his filmography. "I've imagined someone that wants to explore my work but has no clue where to begin. Something like 'Hellbound' might come off as too heavy a lift for some viewers, so I wanted to put together something more compact — like a self-contained short story that captures the vibe of my earlier works."
Forbes
23-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘Revelations' Director Yeon Sang-Ho Shares BTS Details On His Film
Ryu Jun-yeol as Pastor Sung Min-chan in 'Revelations' If there's one throughline that ties together the works of Director Yeon Sang-ho—known for Train to Busan, Hellbound and Parasyte: The Grey, among other thrillers—it's that they make viewers think. 'I think the best thing about watching a movie is that the moment it ends, it starts again, because you start thinking about that movie,' Yeon says. 'I've always wanted to make films that get you to start thinking about the message the second the movie ends.' Yeon's latest feature Revelations, which premiered on Netflix on March 21st, is no different. Based on the eponymous webtoon that Yeon himself created with writer and frequent collaborator Choi Gyu-seok, Revelations is a dark, twisted thriller that illustrates how a person's strong but misguided convictions can set them down a path of destruction. Ryu Jun-yeol (The 8 Show, A Taxi Driver) delivers a mind-blowing performance as Sung Min-chan, a pastor who, after receiving what he believes to be divine revelations, becomes hellbent on tracking down and punishing the culprit in a missing person case. Detective Lee Yeon-hui (played by Shin Hyun-been of Hospital Playlist and Reborn Rich) is assigned to the case and also chases after the suspect, all the while being tormented by visions of her dead sister. Over the course of two hours, the film raises plenty of questions about faith, morality and human fragility. It also serves as a chilling reminder that anyone—no matter how good their intentions might be—can cause substantial harm to themselves and to others if they become too entrenched in their beliefs. And at a time when ideological divides and religious and political extremism are at a fever pitch, viewers will certainly be able to draw many real-world parallels. I spoke to Director Yeon over Zoom to hear his insights on some of the themes explored in Revelations and to learn more about how the webtoon was brought to screen. Regina Kim: You've previously worked with writer Choi Gyu-seok on both the webcomic and the screen adaptation for Hellbound. How did you come to collaborate with him again on Revelations? Yeon Sang-ho: After we released Hellbound season 1, writer Choi and I were brainstorming ideas for its second season. We just bounced around lots of ideas and, in the process, came up with the story for Revelations. We worked on the webcomic Revelations on the Kakao platform, and that actually came out before the webtoon for Hellbound season 2. Because it was a shorter story compared to season two of Hellbound, we were able to create the webtoon more quickly. We worked on the screen adaptation for Hellbound season 2 before we did it for Revelations, but for the webcomic, it was the other way around. Kim: How do you know writer Choi? What's your relationship with him? Yeon: We went to the same college. I majored in oil painting, and writer Choi majored in animation, and we knew each other while in college. We're still best buddies. We collaborated on Hellbound season 1 for the first time officially, but even before then, we always had lots of conversations about each other's works and helped each other out. Shin Hyun-been as Lee Yeon-hui in 'Revelations' Kim: What made you decide to create the webtoon for Revelations, and why did you want to bring it to screen? Yeon: I think it stemmed from the character Sung Min-chan. Someone who sees only what he wants to see and believes only what he wants to believe. And there's this phenomenon called pareidolia where you see something the way you want to see it. I thought of weaving this concept of pareidolia together with the character of Min-chan, and that's how our conversations started. Then this other character Lee Yeon-hui, who's like Min-chan in some ways but also the opposite of him at the same time, came up naturally in our conversations and was developed. That's how we got the outline for the story. Kim: Ah, got it. Actually, before I watched Revelations, I didn't even know what terms like apophenia and pareidolia even meant. But now I know thanks to you! Yeon: There was this current affairs TV show that talked about pareidolia, and that's when I first learned of the concept. Revelations (L to R) Ryu Jun-yeol as Sung Min-chan, Shin Min-jae as Kwon Yang-rae in 'Revelations' Kim: I see. How did Ryu Jun-yeol come to be cast for the role of Min-chan? His performance was so phenomenal, it left me stunned. Why did you decide to cast him? Yeon: Jun-yeol's acting skills really stand out among peers in his age group. In portraying this character Min-chan, I think we were in desperate need of his acting abilities and his way of interpreting the film. As we were working on the film, Jun-yeol made Min-chan into an even more three-dimensional character. He was always proactively sharing his ideas, and that really helped flesh out the character of Min-chan. Kim: Did you, from the beginning, want Ryu Jun-yeol to portray Min-chan? Yeon: I did. Because Jun-yeol actually looks a bit like the character in the comic, and as I just mentioned, he's an amazing actor, especially considering his age, so I hoped he'd take on this role. Sung Min-chan in 'Revelations' webtoon Kim: Well, I think he was a perfect choice. Also, I noticed that Alfonso Cuarón is an executive producer of this film. How did that happen? Yeon: His production company, which co-produced this film, reached out to me and said he wanted to collaborate with me. They said it didn't have to be in English and that it could be a Korean-language film. So I proposed working on Revelations together, since Director Cuarón seems to be interested in [those kinds of works]. I think it was during the height of the pandemic, and my whole family had COVID, so I remember having my first meeting with him via a video call. I shared the outline of the story I had in mind, and he was intrigued and happy to develop it further together with me. Shin Min-jae in Episode 1 of Netflix's 'The Bequeathed' Kim: I read some Korean news articles saying that the name of the actor who plays Kwon Yang-rae is Shin Min-jae, whom you've collaborated with before. Is this your third or fourth time collaborating with him? Yeon: I think the fourth, yeah. He had a small part in JUNG_E and also made a brief appearance in The Bequeathed, which I wrote the script for, and also in Parasyte: The Grey. Min-jae used to be bigger and had an adorable image when he appeared in indie films. He lost a lot of weight to play Yang-rae, so you may not recognize him. If you saw Parasyte: The Grey, there's a scene where Koo Kyo-hwan's character Seol Kang-woo steals a motorcycle from a motorcycle shop. Min-jae played the owner of that shop. Kim: Really? I should rewatch that scene! Yeon: Yeah, he probably seems like a different person there. (laughs) Shin Min-jae (left) and Koo Kyo-hwan (right) in 'Parasyte: The Grey' Kim: After the trailer for Revelations dropped, I read that a lot of Korean fans were like, 'He looks a lot like Director Yeon.' Yeon: In the past, when we were filming other projects, a lot of people said the same thing on set. It was like our little inside joke, but now that he's got a bigger role, I guess the secret's out. (laughs) Kim: Yeah, I feel like you two share a similar vibe. Yeon: We look even more alike after he lost weight. I don't think non-Korean fans will be able to tell us apart! Kim: I thought the same thing for a split second! Like, why is Director Yeon also acting in this movie? Anyway, the title of the film is Revelations, but I don't think it ever mentions the Book of Revelation. Is the title referring to the Book of Revelation in the Bible, or is it more generally referring to divine revelations given by God? Yeon: The whole story is basically about events that arise from a series of divine revelations taking place. I wanted the title to give the impression of a chain of revelations happening, so I came up with 'Revelations.' It doesn't necessarily have to do with the Book of Revelation. Ryu Jun-yeol as Sung Min-chan in 'Revelations' Kim: There's one scene in the movie that really stayed with me. It's when Min-chan and his congregation are praying for [the missing girl] A-yeong, and A-yeong's mom looks around at the churchgoers and seems shocked and scared when she sees them praying loudly and shouting. What was going on in her head at that moment? Yeon: A-yeong's mother fears that her daughter could already be dead. But also, Min-chan, in his prayer, assumes that A-yeong is dead, and the church members are all agreeing with him as they pray for her soul to be saved. And that scares her too. I think she's scared because her daughter could be alive, but everyone around her is acting like she's dead. There were actually scenes in the early cuts of the movie where A-yeong is shown to be alive and waiting for someone to come to her rescue, but I took all those scenes out because I wanted the audience to also be unsure of whether A-yeong was alive or not. I think it worked as a good device to heighten the tension in the movie and test the belief of the audience. Kim: Ah, I thought A-yeong's mother was shocked and scared because the church members seemed overly fervent in their prayers, as if they'd gone a bit mad, but I guess that wasn't the case. As for Min-chan, he seems like an ordinary person in the beginning of the film but slowly descends into madness. Would you say that his church becomes a cult as he becomes increasingly delusional? Yeon: Well, a church is not just about its pastor. I don't think you can say for sure that just because Min-chan's faith becomes increasingly twisted, his congregation's faith becomes twisted too. What I wanted to show with this film is that Min-chan isn't a crazy or abnormal person in the beginning—he starts off being a normal person who has sincere faith. I thought it was important to show how an ordinary person can be driven to madness by certain events and the choices they make to believe in certain things. Director Yeon Sang-ho and Shin Hyun-been as Lee Yeon-hui in 'Revelations' Kim: What is the core message that you hope viewers will take away from this film? Yeon: I guess the core message of the film is conveyed by the two characters Yeon-hui and Min-chan. I wanted to show the downfall and redemption of people who see only what they want to see and believe only what they want to believe. Kim: As I was watching this movie, I wondered if Min-chan was a villain. Like, how at fault is he when he becomes mentally unstable and truly believes that he's carrying out God's will? Yeon: I actually thought Min-chan and Yeon-hui were two quite similar people. Yeon-hui is driven by vengeance, and Min-chan uses divine revelations to justify his actions. But when he justifies his actions with his faith, he lacks objectivity. So this story could be about what the consequences are when you try to justify your actions with your beliefs while lacking objectivity. Kim: Some directors don't really like giving away too much about their movies in interviews, so I really appreciate you sharing these details. I think I'll have a deeper understanding of the film when I watch it again. I have one more question about Min-chan. Exactly how and why is he driven to insanity? Yeon: There's a saying in Korea, 'a-jeon-in-su' (아전인수), and that means interpreting everything in one's own favor. I think we all do that to some extent as human beings—we all want to interpret things in a way that suits our own interests. But Min-chan is someone who goes overboard with that. And you could say that it's materialistic greed that drives him to believe that he can become the pastor of this big church. But because he's a pious person, he just can't come to terms with his materialistic greed, so he tries to sugarcoat it and justify it through other means. And that's what shapes his character in this film. Sung Min-chan (Ryu Jun-yeol) realizes he finally has the opportunity to lead a big church in ... More 'Revelations' Kim: When I look at your previous works, I feel like you like to explore the theme of religion, and Revelations also deals a lot with religion. Is there a reason why you keep coming back to this theme? Yeon: I think I'm interested in human fragility and faith. And to convey those themes clearly in a [thriller], I tend to use religion or crime, like I did with Revelations. We have this religious character Min-chan and this detective Yeon-hui who wants personal revenge, and these characters serve as devices to dramatically showcase human fragility, guilt and faith. Kim: Towards the end of the movie, Yeon-hui's father sends her a photo of an oculus, or a 'one-eyed window.' That's when Yeon-hui realizes that the 'one-eyed monster' is referring to the oculus. Why doesn't she just call her father back and ask him to find A-yeong? Yeon: The place in the picture is not where A-yeong is locked up. It's just a window with the same architectural design. What's important is the moment that Yeon-hui realizes that Yang-rae is traumatized by oculus windows. Yeon-hui has always thought of him as a devil, so she doesn't acknowledge the fact that he's got his own trauma and feelings. At the end of the movie though, she decides to acknowledge this and goes to meet with the psychology professor to learn more about Yang-rae's trauma. And that's when she realizes that the 'one-eyed monster' is actually the style of a window that traumatized him. Revelations Shin Min-jae as Kwon Yang-rae in 'Revelations' Kim: In the film's final scene, we see a stain on the wall in Min-chan's cell. It first looks like the face of Jesus, but as he scrubs it, it seems to turn into the face of a demon. What's the symbolism behind that scene? Yeon: In the scene just before that, Yeon-hui asks Min-chan who gave him those revelations. I think the final scene is the answer to her question. Min-chan is unsure at the end whether it was God who gave him those revelations, or a demon, or whether it was nothing and just a stain. So that symbolizes the internal confusion that Min-chan is experiencing. That's how I wanted to end this film. This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity. Many thanks to Director Yeon Sang-ho for taking the time to chat about his latest film Revelations! Revelations is currently streaming on Netflix.
Korea Herald
18-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Yeon Sang-ho tests faith with 'Revelations'
Director and cast discuss their upcoming Netflix thriller at a pre-release press conference in Seoul Alphonso Cuaron was following Yeon Sang-ho's career long before most film fans knew the Korean director's name. "It started when 'The King of Pigs' went to Cannes," Yeon told reporters during Tuesday's production briefing at a Seoul hotel. "That was 14 years ago." Now the Oscar-winning auteur has partnered with Yeon as an executive producer on Netflix's "Revelations," a new film that strips away the fantastical elements of Yeon's previous work to explore the uncertain boundaries of divine inspiration. "Revelations" follows Pastor Min-chan (Ryu Jun-yeol), who believes he's received a message from God identifying a suspect in a churchgoer's disappearance, and Detective Yeon-hui (Shin Hyun-been), who investigates the case as she battles visions of her dead sister. Shin Min-jae plays Yang-rae, an ex-convict whose guilt or innocence forms the story's central tension. "It's about people who only see what they want to see and believe what they want to believe," Yeon said. "I tried to create something realistic, intimate — a psychological thriller without the fantasy elements I've used before." Yeon and screenwriter Choi Gyu-seok adapted their own webtoon but made significant changes along the way. The pastor evolved from a secular character to a devout one, partly at Ryu's suggestion. "Starting from ordinary faith gives the character somewhere to fall from," Yeon explained. Similarly, the detective transformed from stoic to fragile. "I wanted someone crushed by guilt, who might shatter at any moment." Ryu described Yeon's directorial approach with admiration. "I'm constantly questioning things right up until shooting, which must be exhausting," the actor said. "But Yeon actually listens. There were moments when I'd given up on a scene, and he'd suddenly appear and completely reshape it." Hyun-been nodded in agreement. "Despite the heavy material, he creates this atmosphere where you feel free to explore." She praised the production design's meticulous attention to detail: "They created everything down to tissues branded with the church's name — things that barely appear on camera but make the world feel real." The film represents Netflix's continued investment in Korean content, part of a larger strategy that includes seven Korean features planned for 2025. For Yeon, it follows his streaming successes "Hellbound" and "Parasyte: The Grey" as he builds an impressive catalog with the platform. Cuaron's involvement came after Yeon wondered if the acclaimed director might want "another 'Train to Busan,' the 2016 zombie thriller that catapulted Yeon to global recognition. Instead, Cuaron fully embraced Yeon's creative shift. "Throughout production, he kept returning to our initial conversations about my creative vision," Yeon said. "Even during marketing, he'd ask if the trailer properly conveyed what I intended." Produced by Korean company Wowpoint, "Revelations" marks another step in Yeon's busy upcoming slate. He's already lined up "35th Street," a collaboration with Leonardo DiCaprio's production company Appian Way slated for late 2025, and "Face," a lower-budget mystery thriller featuring actor Park Jung-min in dual roles. For Yeon, 'Revelations' represents a distillation of his career. "I started with indie animation and made various films. 'Revelations' feels like I've finally captured my essential colors. If someone hasn't seen any of my work, just watch this one."
