Director Kim Sung-su blends fact with fiction to recreate 1979 coup d'état

Director Kim Sung-su discusses his upcoming film "12.12: The Day," inspired by the 1979 coup d'état in Seoul. The film blends fiction and history, with Hwang Jung-min and Jung Woo-sung playing key characters.

A scene from the upcoming film ″12.12: The Day,″ a fictional account of the Dec. 12 1979 coup d’etat from director Kim Sung-su, starring Hwang Jung-min and Jung Woo-sung [PLUS M ENTERTAINMENT]

On Dec. 12, 1979, gunfire erupted in downtown Seoul. It was the start of former president Chun Doo Hwan’s coup d’état and the military mutiny which would lead to the end of the short period of democratization after former president Park Chung Hee’s assassination. A young student heard the gunfire from a friend’s house in central Seoul's Yongsan District, and 44 years later, that memory became the catalyst that drove the student — director Kim Sung-su — to make the upcoming film, “12.12: The Day.”

“I heard the gunfire on that historic day, and the memory stayed with me for a long time,” the 61-year-old director said during an interview with reporters at a cafe in Jung District, central Seoul, on Monday. “When I first received the script for '12.12: The Day,’ I was surprised and also thrilled. But I also had a lot of reservations and worry — I didn’t know if I could make this story into a film well.”

“12.12: The Day” follows fictional characters closely resembling real-life figures, with Hwang Jung-min playing a military leader named Chun Doo-kwang, modeled after the real-life Chun, who plots to take down the government, and Jung Woo-sung playing Lee Tae-shin, the Commander of the Army Capital Security Command, who takes after the real-life General Jang Tae-wan. Hwang and Jung’s characters face each other in a game of military strategy, and the film takes audiences through a story in which history and fiction blend together.

Director Kim Sung-su [PLUS M ENTERTAINMENT]

A key concern for Kim was not to make the “winners,” or the instigators of the coup d’état, seem like any kind of heroes or even slick bad guys, according to the director.

“I was most worried about depicting the character based on Chun as someone who is in any way admirable or heroic,” Kim said. “I wanted to show this chapter of history, and the fact of the matter is that they won in the end, but I didn’t want to portray these people as those who did any good.”

In real life, the coup d’état of 1979 and the coup d’état of May 17, 1980, ended the Fourth Republic of Korea and led to the establishment of the Fifth Republic of Korea, a de facto dictatorship that lasted until December 1987. These coups, alongside the Gwangju Uprising, were the primary justification for Chun’s 1995 arrest by the Kim Young-sam administration. Chun, who died in 2021, is known to Koreans for never having apologized for the atrocities that took place during his dictatorship.

A scene from ″12.12: The Day″ [PLUS M ENTERTAINMENT]

“I think it was absurd and unreasonable that those involved in the Dec. 12 coup were never really brought to justice,” Kim said. “That was always a mystery to me. And I thought that this film should not be a record of those people’s victory.”

One message that Kim wanted to relay through “12.12: The Day” was how the historically important decisions that change the course of a nation’s future are actually made within seconds and depend on the values of the individuals involved.

“We tend to think that those kind of decisions are made with heavy thought and carefully, but in real life the decisions that change everyone’s fate are made very quickly and rely a lot on only a handful of people,” Kim said. “And when the bad guys face off against those with actual justification, the latter is left without many supporters while the criminals have people lining up to help them.”

On the creative decision to use fictional names for the main characters instead of the actual names of the historical figures they're based off of, Kim said it allowed him much more freedom in directing the film.

“We pondered a lot about whether to use the real names of the people involved in the actual historical event, but decided against it in the end,” Kim said. “And it was the right decision, because I am not a documentary director, and I needed the freedom that came from fictionalizing some of the details.”

A scene from ″12.12: The Day″ [PLUS M ENTERTAINMENT]

A pivotal moment in “12.12: The Day” is a scene where military tanks take over Gwanghwamun, the part of central Seoul closest to the Blue House and the epicenter of the city. All of the shots in this scene were done by shooting on a set by the sea and putting visual effects over the footage.

“I wanted shots that replicated the photographs taken during the actual coup,” Kim said. “The visual effects director and staff did an amazing job recreating those scenes.”

Kim’s latest film was “Asura: The City of Madness” (2016), in which both Hwang and Jung again starred. Working with the two veteran actors again for “12.12: The Day” was different, however, as Kim’s directing style has changed since “Asura: The City of Madness,” he said.

"I wanted to give the feeling of a war reporter’s footage, following the events like the camera is really there while the events are happening,” Kim said. “Both Hwang and Jung are masters in their craft of acting, and I also was glad to work again with them.”

“12.12: The Day” opens in theaters on Nov. 22.

BY LIM JEONG-WON [lim.jeongwon@joongang.co.kr]