‘Parasite’ Director Bong Joon-ho’s Upcoming Animated Feature Will Begin Production Later This Year

According to a Korean news report, Oscar-winning filmmaker Bong Joon-ho’s upcoming untitled animated feature will begin production in the second half of this year.

Korean outlet Daum says that Bong is already splitting time between finishing post-production on his upcoming live-action film Mickey 17 in the U.S. and setting up production on the animated film in Korea.

Bong’s longtime vfx studio, 4th Creative Party, will be handle animation on the upcoming animated feature. In addition to producing the vfx for films such as Stoker, Snowpiercer, and Okja, the studio previously worked on Harlock: Space Pirate, a flashy cg feature produced by AZ Works and Toei Animation Studio in Japan.

Bong has been working on a script for the feature since 2018. Very little plot information is available, but we do know the story will focus on the relationship between humankind and marine life.

Daum is reporting that Bong’s animated film has a budget of roughly 70 billion won ($52.6 million), making it the most expensive Korean film of all time. The previous record holder was Bong’s own Okja, which had a reported budget of $50 million. While the $52.6 million may not be close to the budgets of most U.S. studio features, it’s a princely sum for an animated film almost anywhere else in the world. This year’s Oscar-nominated Robot Dreams had a budget of just $6 million USD.

The Daum piece also says that Sony Pictures is in talks to pick up global distribution rights to the film outside of Korea, where they will go to Bong’s longtime distributor, CJ ENM.