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Hwa-Om-Kyung

1993 South Korean film directed by Jang Seon-u

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 28, 2026
Entity authorityQ5951798 ↗
Source-derived summary

Hwa-Om-Kyung (also known as Passage to Buddha) is a 1993 South Korean film written and directed by Jang Sun-woo. It is an adaptation of the Avatamsaka Sutra of Mahayana Buddhism.

The movie in 1994 won the now-defunct Alfred Bauer Prize from the Berlin International Film Festival, an honor for a work that "opens new perspectives on cinematic art.

Plot

This Buddhist-themed story is about a boy searching for his mother, who abandoned him as a baby, and the people he meets on his journey.

Cast

Oh Tae-kyung as Seon-jae

Won Mi-kyung as Lady of lotus

Lee Ho-jae as Beob-un

Lee Hye-young as Ma-ni

Kim Hye-sun as I-ryeon

Lee Dae-ro as Lighthouse keeper

Dokgo Young-jae as Hae-un

Shin Hyun-joon as Ji-ho

Jeong Soo-young as I-na

Um Chun-bae as Deok-ku

Awards

Wins

44th Berlin International Film Festival (1994), Alfred Bauer Prize

Nominations

Berlin International Film Festival (1994), Golden Berlin Bear

References

Bibliography

Paquet, Darcy. "Green Fish". koreanfilm.org. Retrieved 2021-07-06.

Aliberti, Davide. "Passage to Buddha".

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Hwa-Om-Kyung” is 1993 South Korean film directed by Jang Seon-u. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Hwa-Om-Kyung, South and Korean, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA productive route into publication, performance and collection histories when the underlying object or edition remains clearly identified. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1993, 1994, 2021—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1993-05-26. For this dossier, Hwa-Om-Kyung, South and Korean is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “1993 South Korean film directed by Jang Seon-u” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5951798. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1993, 1994 and 2021.

Critical limits

Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Hwa-Om-Kyung”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Hwa-Om-Kyung primary sources, Hwa-Om-Kyung archive and Hwa-Om-Kyung research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Hwa-Om-Kyung”?
  2. Which edition, object, performance or recording is being described?
  3. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Hwa-Om-Kyung” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.