'Hope' Trailer: South Korea's Most Expensive Film
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- "Hope" cost ₩50 billion (~$33 million USD), reportedly making it the most expensive film ever produced in South Korea, per the source
- Na Hong-jin directed "Hope" as his first English-language feature, following his Korean-language trilogy "The Chaser," "The Yellow Sea," and "The Wailing"
- The film premiered in competition at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival, where it was one of the most highly anticipated premieres of the festival
- IndieWire's David Ehrlich praised the opening third as delivering on "every scrap of scattered promise" from Na's earlier work, but said the film became "a massive disappointment" by the end
- The ensemble cast includes Hwang Jung-Min, Zo In-Sung, Hoyeon, Taylor Russell, Cameron Britton, Alicia Vikander, and Michael Fassbender
- Neon is set to release "Hope" in American theaters on Wednesday, September 9
Why it matters: At ~$33 million, "Hope" sets a budget ceiling for South Korean genre cinema, and Na Hong-jin's leap from Korean-language arthouse thrillers to an English-language creature feature with A-list Hollywood casting tests whether Korean genre directors can command blockbuster-scale resources — though IndieWire's mixed Cannes verdict, praising the opening while calling the ending "a massive disappointment," underscores the gamble of scaling up.
