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Lee Joon-ik, Yoo Jae-suk honored at 57th Baeksang Arts Awards
  • May 17, 2021

Lee Joon-ik, Yoo Jae-suk honored
at 57th Baeksang Arts Awards

Updated : 2021-05-16 15:49
 

By Kwak Yeon-soo

Director Lee Joon-ik of the period film "Book of Fish" and comedian Yoo Jae-suk were the big winners at this year's Baeksang Arts Awards.

At the ceremony that took place on Thursday evening at KINTEX exhibition hall in Goyang, Gyeonggi Province, Lee became a three-time grand prize winner after taking home the same award in 2006 for "King and the Clown" and in 2016 for "The Throne" and "Dongju: The Portrait of a Poet."

"A period film costs so much to make. The cast and crew made sacrifices in order to bring this film to the big screen. The film wasn't a big success although it received good reviews from critics and movie fans. Thank you for the award," Lee said during his acceptance speech.

The acclaimed director also paid tribute to the late veteran film producer Lee Choon-yun, who passed away on May 11. He was the head of Cine 2000 and producer of hit films including "Art Museum By the Zoo" (1988) and "The Terror Live" (2013).

Director Bong Joon-ho attended this year's event as presenter, after he didn't show up at last year's event even though he won the grand prize for his black comedy thriller "Parasite." It has been reported that his next project will be an animated film about deep-sea creatures. He is now writing the script for a currently unnamed English-language film.

The female-driven mystery comedy "Samjin Company English Class" won the Best Film award, while director Hong Eui-jeong of the crime thriller "Voice of Silence" received the Best Director award. Filmmaker Park Ji-wan won the Best Screenplay award for his crime drama "The Day I Died: Unclosed Case."

Yoo Ah-in won the Best Actor award for his role as a mute crime scene cleaner in "Voice of Silence," while Jun Jong-seo took home the Best Actress award for her role as a psychopath in the thriller "The Call."

The Best Supporting Actor and Actress awards in the film category went to Park Jung-min, who played a transgender character in "Deliver Us from Evil," and Kim Sun-young, who played an ailing single mom in "Three Sisters."

Comedian Yoo won the grand prize for hosting hit variety shows such as tvN's "You Quiz of the Block" and MBC's "Hangout with Yoo." With the latest recognition, Yoo became a two-time grand prize winner following 2013 for SBS's "Running Man"

"I don't know what to say. It's such a pleasure and honor to accept this award. People call me a presenter or TV show host, but I'm a comedian. I'll try to arouse more laughter in the future," Yoo said in his acceptance speech.

JTBC's drama series "Beyond Evil" grabbed three awards ― Best Drama, Best Screenplay and Best Actor for Shin Ha-kyun. Kim So-yeon won the Best Actress award for her performance in "The Penthouse: War in Life."

The Best Director award in the TV category went to Kim Cheol-kyu of tvN's drama series, "Flower of Evil." The Best Supporting Actor and Actress awards in TV went to Oh Jung-se, who played a patient with autism in tvN's "It's Okay to Not Be Okay," and Yeom Hye-ran who played the leader of the counters in OCN's "Uncanny Counter."

For variety shows, singer-actor Lee Seung-gi won Best Variety Performer awards for JTBC's "Sing Again" and Jang Do-yeon won for MBC's "I Live Alone."

The TikTok Popularity Awards, voted by video app TikTok users around the world, went to Kim Sun-ho of tvN's drama series, "Start-Up," and Seo Yea-ji of, "It's Okay to Not Be Okay."

The organizing committee shrugged off a dispute surrounding Seo despite growing calls to remove her from the list of nominees as she has been embroiled in controversy over manipulating and controlling her then-boyfriend Kim Jung-hyun in 2018.