Actor Lee Ha-nui once again proved she is an irreplaceable actor by winning the top acting award in the drama institutional sector.
Lee Ha-nui won the top acting award in the drama institutional sector at the 2025 Seoul International Film Awards held at Seoul Dragon City in Yongsan-gu, Seoul, on the 10th.
She left a remark saying, "I have been drawing boundaries vertically and horizontally, wondering where I stand now as an actor and what kind of actor I should become. I love acting so much that I want to do this work for a long time like the senior colleagues here. I will do my best in my place, cherish the name "actor," and become a person worthy of it. I am sincerely grateful to have been given this meaningful award."
This year Lee Ha-nui continued to be active across OTT and the screen. In the Netflix series Aema, Lee Ha-nui played top star Jung Hee-ran, who bravely confronts the harsh reality hidden behind the glamorous spotlight amid the production process of a sexploitation film that struck Korea in the 1980s, and she firmly carried the center of the story. She showed an overwhelming presence that changed the atmosphere in every appearing scene through detailed performance design: visuals that perfectly melted into the character, Seoul dialect that added realism, breathing with finely adjusted intensity, and line delivery that captured the character's unique rhythm.
In particular, Lee Ha-nui portrayed the top actor of the era, "Jung Hee-ran," not as a figure simply consumed but as a charismatic, agentic character who redefines her acting and life and broadens the ground for junior actresses. By delicately expressing Jung Hee-ran's internal drive and the direction of her narrative, she made the work's message even clearer and elicited deep empathy from viewers.
In the film The Upstairs Neighbors, which opened on the 3rd, Lee Ha-nui played Su-gyeong, a psychiatrist and the upstairs wife, showing another spectrum of her acting. She added vitality to the film by expressing precarious emotional fractures where humor and tension intersect through a trustworthy tone, precise line delivery, and subtle facial changes. Thanks to this passionate performance, The Upstairs Neighbors ranked first at the Korean box office for Korean films for eight consecutive days after its opening, according to the Korea Film Council (KOFIC) integrated box office system on the 11th.
Active across OTT and the screen, Lee Ha-nui has once again proven her strength as a definite "box-office draw" and a "reliable actor," raising expectations for her future activities.
[Photo] Provided by TEAMHOPE.
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