Now well into her third decade of working in the cinema, Seoul-born Bae Doona has established herself as an international icon, appearing in movies by leading lights of South Korean cinema like Park Chan-wook and Bong Joon-ho, Japanese auteurs like Hirokazu Kore-eda and Nobuhiro Yamashita, America’s Lilly and Lana Wachowski, and many others. Whether the part calls for William Tell-like sharpshooting with bow and arrow, raw riot grrrl vocals, or inventing the idiosyncratic gestural vocabulary of an inflatable doll that’s suddenly gained consciousness, Doona can always be counted on to deliver the goods. A bona fide superstar with a cult actor’s taste for projects focused on outsiders and eccentrics, her dizzyingly diverse filmography is unified by the unerring commitment of her work, her wide-eyed face proving time and again to be one of the most expressive and versatile in contemporary cinema.
