Minari (2020) on Netflix
Jacob Yi moves his wife Monica and their children David and Anne from California to farmland in Arkansas. He plans to grow Korean produce there to sell to buyers in Dallas.
- Netflix3.5/5
- IMDb7.4/10127,462 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes98%
Trailer
Plot summary
Jacob Yi brings his family from California to rural Arkansas in 1983, where he hopes the soil will let him grow Korean fruits and vegetables for buyers in Dallas. His wife Monica dislikes the mobile home and the long drive to a hospital, because their son David has a heart condition. Both parents sex chicks at a hatchery nearby. Paul, a local Korean War veteran, helps Jacob on the land. Monica's mother Soon-ja travels from South Korea to look after the children while the parents work.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Minari (2020)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Chung had initially hoped to adapt My Ántonia by Willa Cather, but found out that Cather did not want film adaptations of her works to be made, and was inspired to make a film about his own childhood instead.
- Chung said his parents are private people and that he did not even tell them he was making the film until he was in the editing room with it, after he had shot it, because he was so scared about what they would say.
- At the 93rd Academy Awards the film earned six nominations, including Best Picture, and won Best Supporting Actress for Youn, who became the first Korean actor to win an Oscar.
- The Golden Globes rule that any film with over 50% of its dialogue not in English counts as foreign-language put Minari in that category rather than Best Drama, and Lulu Wang, whose film The Farewell hit the same rule, wrote that she had not seen a more American film that year.
- Han initially felt she could not participate because she needed to film Nokdu Flower, and suggested Chun Woo-hee as an alternate, as she felt it was important that a Korean-born woman portray Monica.
- Chung told Youn not to play Soon-ja like his own grandmother, and took her suggestions, including one in which her character takes back money her daughter had just put into a church collection plate, an idea his religious background made him hesitant about.
- Principal photography began in July 2019 in Tulsa, Oklahoma and lasted 25 days, and in order to make a deadline for Sundance, editor Harry Yoon edited the film as production took place.
