Bong Joon-ho was born in Daegu, South Korea in 1969, the youngest of four children. His father was Bong Sang-gyun, a graphic and industrial designer and professor, while his mother Park So-young was a full-time housewife. Bong's maternal grandfather, Park Taewon, was an esteemed author during the Japanese colonial period, most famous for his work A Day in the Life of Gubo the Novelist and his defection to North Korea in 1950. Bong's older brother Bong Joon-soo is an English professor at the Seoul National University, while his older sister Bong Ji-hee teaches fashion styling at Anyang University.
While Bong was in elementary school, the family relocated to Seoul, taking up residence in Jamsil-dong by the Han River. Bong enrolled in Yonsei University in 1988, majoring in sociology.[10] College campuses such as Yonsei's were then hotbeds for the South Korean democracy movement, and Bong was an active participant of student demonstrations, frequently subjected to tear gas early in his college years.[10][13]
Bong served a two-year term in the military in accordance with South Korea's compulsory military service before returning to college in 1992.[10] He co-founded a film club named Yellow Door with students from neighboring universities.[10] As a member of the club, Bong made his first films, including a stop-motion short titled Looking for Paradise and a 16mm short titled White Man.[10] He graduated from Yonsei University in 1995.[10]
In the early 1990s, Bong completed a two-year program at the Korean Academy of Film Arts. While there, he made many 16mm short films. His graduation films Memory Within the Frame and Incoherence were invited to screen at the Vancouver and Hong Kong international film festivals. He also collaborated on several works with his classmates — most notably as cinematographer on the highly acclaimed short 2001 Imagine, directed by his friend Jang Joon-hwan. Aside from cinematography on Hur Jae-young's short A Hat, Bong was also lighting director on an early short Sounds From Heaven and Earth by Choi Equan, and The Love of a Grape Seed.[9] Bong studied Martin Scorsese films and cited him as one of his major filmmaking influences.[14]
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