RESTORATION
Thirteen Korean films. Original film elements. A major 4K restoration and preservation programme bringing a little-known chapter of Korean cinema back to the screen.
The Whapung Restoration Project is a long-term programme initiated by Karmax-910 to preserve, restore and reintroduce internationally thirteen Korean films produced by Chung Chang-wha’s Whapung company between 1979 and 1985.
First announced internationally in 2023, the project entered its major technical phase in 2026, with the systematic inspection, preparation, 4K scanning and restoration of the surviving film elements.
The objective is not simply to make these films available again, but to return to the best surviving original materials and create new high-quality masters capable of preserving the films for future theatrical, archival and home-video presentation.
BACK TO THE ORIGINAL FILM ELEMENTS
The foundation of the restoration programme is exceptional: surviving original film elements preserved in South Korea and deposited by Chung Chang-wha with the Korean Film Archive (KOFA) several decades ago.
The restoration programme is being carried out in collaboration with the Korean Film Archive, which provides the necessary technical access to these preserved elements for the films concerned.
Working from original film materials whenever they survive allows the project to move far beyond the ageing video copies through which some of these films have occasionally circulated. The aim is to recover as faithfully as possible their original photographic qualities, framing, colour, texture and sound.
A 4K RESTORATION PROGRAMME
The thirteen films are being handled individually according to the condition and characteristics of their surviving materials.
The technical workflow includes the inspection and preparation of the film elements, 4K scanning, image restoration, colour work and the treatment and preservation of the best available sound sources.
Because archival film elements do not all survive in identical condition, restoration decisions are made on a title-by-title basis. Original negatives are used wherever available, while surviving duplicate or supplementary elements may be evaluated when necessary.
The guiding principle throughout the project is preservation rather than reinvention: the films are restored as historical works, respecting their original photography, editing and production characteristics.
THE 2026 RESTORATION CAMPAIGN
Although the international rediscovery of the Whapung catalogue was announced in 2023, 2026 marks the beginning of the project’s large-scale technical restoration campaign in South Korea.
The programme is being carried out progressively across the thirteen films, with professional Korean film-restoration specialists working directly from the surviving elements.
The first titles have already undergone 4K scanning and restoration work, establishing the technical workflow that will be applied across the collection. The programme is continuing throughout 2026, with the objective of having the thirteen films progress through the essential 4K digitisation stage by the end of the year.
Restoration, quality control and preparation of final presentation masters continue independently for each film according to the specific requirements of its surviving materials.
WITH THE SUPPORT OF CHUNG CHANG-WHA
The project is being undertaken with the support and approval of Chung Chang-wha, whose decision to preserve and deposit his surviving film materials decades ago has made the present restoration programme possible.
His involvement gives the project an essential historical continuity: films produced through Whapung more than four decades ago are now being returned to the original materials preserved by the filmmaker himself.
The restoration programme is therefore also part of a broader effort to document and reassess a comparatively little-known period in Chung Chang-wha’s career — his work as a producer following his internationally celebrated years as a director in Korea and Hong Kong.
PROJECT SUPERVISION
The editorial and restoration follow-up of The Whapung Collection is supervised for Karmax-910 by French film historian, filmmaker and Asian cinema specialist Frédéric Ambroisine.
Ambroisine’s work with Chung Chang-wha goes back more than two decades. He first filmed an extensive interview with Chung in the early 2000s for the French DVD edition of King Boxer released by Wild Side, documenting his Korean career and his years working in Hong Kong.
Material from these interviews was later revisited for Arrow Video’s Shawscope Volume One, further documenting Chung’s career for an international audience.
This long-standing work on Chung Chang-wha’s cinema now continues through the Whapung project. For Karmax-910, Ambroisine coordinates the collection’s historical and editorial research, follows the restoration process and source materials, and contributes to the preparation and international presentation of the restored films.
FROM ONE REDISCOVERY TO ANOTHER
The Whapung programme follows another major restoration project undertaken by Karmax-910 and Frédéric Ambroisine: the rediscovery and 4K restoration of Lo Lieh’s 1983 Hong Kong–Thai fantasy horror film The Black Magic with Buddha.
That project involved extensive archival research, the identification and comparison of different surviving versions, the recovery of missing material and the reconstruction of historically distinct Mandarin and Cantonese cuts.
The Whapung Collection expands this approach from the restoration of a single film to the preservation and international rediscovery of an entire group of works.
DISCOVER THE BLACK MAGIC WITH BUDDHA RESTORATION PROJECT →
PRESERVING THE FILMS — BRINGING THEM BACK TO THE SCREEN
For decades, the thirteen films in The Whapung Collection have remained largely inaccessible to audiences outside South Korea.
The restoration programme is designed to change that.
As the work progresses, the new masters will provide the foundation for the films’ return through festivals, cinematheques, theatrical screenings, physical media and other forms of international distribution.
At the same time, the project preserves a body of work that documents an important but insufficiently explored period in both Chung Chang-wha’s career and Korean cinema of the late 1970s and 1980s.
Thirteen films.
Original film elements.
New 4K restorations.
A forgotten collection returning to the screen.