Cover From left: Park Hae-il, Park Chan-wook and Tang Wei
From left: Park Hae-il, Park Chan-wook and Tang Wei
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First published in Korean by ‘Oldboy’ director Park Chan-wook, this new Chinese edition of the book is a behind-the-scenes look at Park’s thriller movie
After taking the film industry by storm with her acting prowess, Golden Horse award-winning Chinese actress Tang Wei has ventured into the world of publishing. She has published the Chinese edition of a book titled Decision to Leave Storyboard Book, which gives readers the behind-the-scenes details from the 2022 mystery romance film Decision to Leave directed by acclaimed South Korean director Park Chan-wook. Tang and Park were at Hong Kong’s Broadway Cinematheque in Yau Ma Tei yesterday evening, December 7, to launch this book.
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Above “Decision to Leave Storyboard Book”
“Decision to Leave Storyboard Book”
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Originally published in Korean in 2022 by the director himself, the book contains 154 storyboards from the film, detailing the props, sets and camera angles envisaged by Park, his storyboard designer Lee yun-ho and playwright Chung Seo-kyung. It also features conversations between Park, Tang, Chung and male lead Park Hae-il during the filming process.
“Originally, [Park] thought I was only joking when I said I wanted to work on this book. It was after the third time [we talked about it] at Cannes that he realised that I was serious about this,” Tang said at the book launch. “He asked me, ‘Do you really want to do it?’ and I answered, ‘Yes, I really want to do this’.” Indeed, Park supported the actress throughout the planning and publication process.
Tang, who played the lead role in the film, won the Best Actress at the Blue Dragon Film Awards in 2022, for her portrayal of Seo Rae, a Chinese immigrant in South Korea and a suspect in a police investigation. The film’s noir aesthetics have drawn comparison with the 1958 thriller Vertigo by Alfred Hitchcock, who was known for his well-structured storyboards—a technique that Park has been inspired by.
“I had never seen such complete storyboards of a movie before I started shooting for Decision to Leave,” says Tang in a press statement. “From the perspective of an actor, reading storyboards is like the director [breaking down] my role scene by scene.”
Zabrina is the Senior Editor, Arts and Culture of Tatler Hong Kong. She specialises in performing arts, visual art and film. Her wanderlust was first fuelled by the Mighty Rovers Antarctica Expedition 2010. Over the years, she has interviewed A-list artists and filmmakers, including Oscar winners Chlóe Zhao and Tim Yip, Golden Horse winner Sylvia Chang, In the Mood for Love cinematographer Christopher Doyle, Pachinko author Min Jin Lee, and Coachella’s first Chinese solo singer Jackson Wang. She won gold at the WAN-IFRA Asian Media Awards for her 2021 feature on the waves of hate crimes targeting Asian Americans.
