Park Chan-wook Named First South Korean President of Cannes Film Festival Jury

Park Chan-wook will preside over the jury of the 79th Cannes Film Festival, becoming the first South Korean filmmaker to lead the competition in the festival's nearly eight-decade history.

The appointment, announced by Festival de Cannes on Thursday, cements Korean cinema's position at the apex of global film culture. Park succeeds French actress Juliette Binoche, whose jury awarded last year's Palme d'Or to Jafar Panahi's Iranian drama It Was Just an Accident.

A Cannes Veteran

Park's relationship with Cannes stretches back over two decades. He first arrived in 2004 with Oldboy, the second installment of his Vengeance Trilogy, which won the Grand Prix and became a cult landmark of 21st-century cinema. The film's visceral storytelling and virtuosic hammer fight sequence announced a filmmaker unafraid to push aesthetic boundaries.

He returned with Thirst in 2009, picking up the Jury Prize for his vampire romance. The Handmaiden screened in competition in 2016, and Decision to Leave earned him the Best Director award in 2022, his most recent Cannes honor before this historic appointment.

History in the Making

Park is only the second Asian filmmaker to serve as Cannes jury president after Wong Kar-wai, who held the position 20 years ago. The selection marks a deliberate turn toward recognizing Korean cinema's transformative influence on global film.

"Park Chan-wook's inventiveness, visual mastery, and penchant for capturing the multiple impulses of women and men with strange destinies have given contemporary cinema some truly memorable moments," festival president Iris Knobloch and director Thierry Frémaux said in a joint statement. "We are delighted to celebrate his immense talent and, more broadly, the cinema of a country deeply engaged with the questioning of our time."

The Director's Response

Park, whose latest film No Other Choice earned three Golden Globe nominations, offered a characteristically philosophical response to the appointment.

"The theater is dark so that we may see the light of cinema. We confine ourselves within the theater so that our souls may be liberated through the window of film," he said. "To be enclosed in a theater to watch films, and enclosed again to engage in debate with the members of the jury, this double, voluntary confinement is something I await with great anticipation."

Addressing the current geopolitical climate, Park added: "In this age of mutual hatred and division, I believe that the simple act of gathering in a theater to watch a single film together, our breaths and heartbeats aligning, is itself a moving and universal expression of solidarity."

Korean Cinema's Cannes Legacy

Park's presidency arrives as Korean filmmakers continue to dominate the international festival circuit. Bong Joon-ho became the first Korean director to win the Palme d'Or in 2019 with Parasite, which went on to make Oscar history as the first non-English-language film to win Best Picture.

The festival has championed Korean cinema since Im Kwon-taek won Best Director for Strokes of Fire in 2002. Hong Sang-soo, Lee Chang-dong, Kim Jee-woon, and Yeon Sang-ho have all competed in subsequent years, establishing Korean film as a consistent presence in Cannes' marquee section.

Park's jury will award the 2026 Palme d'Or on Saturday, May 23, at the Grand Théâtre Lumière.