Teaching Practice (2025) by Kim Min-ha

Kang Eun-kyung arrives for her teaching practicum at her former high school. The three members of the Kuroi Sora black magic club dominate the national mock exam by supernatural means. Behind them: a witch. Behind the witch: the ghost of the college entrance exam, manifested as subject-specific entities — mathematics, foreign languages — whose mock test is fatal. Eun-kyung must enter the world of darkness to retrieve stolen student souls. Written and directed by Kim Min-ha — inspired by the Whispering Corridors series and the 2023 teachers’ rights protest — as a standalone sequel to School Anniversary (2024), first entry in a planned five-film anthology. Produced by 26 Company, distributed by Studio Santa Claus Entertainment. Korean theatrical May 13, 2026.

Screen Anarchy called it “a bigger and better sequel” and the franchise “wonderful horror-comedy.” Kim Min-ha cited Whispering Corridors as his direct cinematic inspiration, positioning Teaching Practice as a generational continuation. He cried during the BIFAN Q&A discussing teacher abuse — confirming genuine social investment. Included in the 2025 Cannes Film Market. Screened at Kaohsiung Film Festival and the 51st Seoul Independent Film Festival.

• Kim Min-ha explicitly cited Whispering Corridors as his direct inspiration — placing the franchise within Korean school horror’s most prestigious generational lineage.

• The 2023 teachers’ rights protest and the private tutoring market’s displacement of public education are the film’s specific social origins.

• The college entrance exam ghost — subject-specific supernatural entities — gives Korea’s most collectively experienced annual event its most formally inventive horror treatment.

• The overbearing parent abuse scene is the film’s most politically pointed social commentary — the sequence that moved the director to tears at the BIFAN Q&A.

• All BIFAN screenings sold out in approximately 4 minutes and 30 seconds.

• Han Sun-hwa’s 2024 summer hit Pilot gives her the strongest commercial fanbase of any lead in the Korean horror-comedy field.

• Screen Anarchy: “bigger and better; impressive and entertaining; horror-comedy reaches delightful new heights.”

• X-Clusive (BIFAN): “delivers on every expectation of the franchise and expands the horror-comedy world intelligently.”

• Korea Times: “recognised for its fresh approach to genre films at various festivals.”

• BIFAN 2025: Korean Fantastic Film Award. Korean Fantastic Actor Award — Han Sun-hwa.

• 2025 Cannes Film Market. Kaohsiung Film Festival. Seoul Independent Film Festival. Korean theatrical May 13, 2026.

• Kim Min-ha — School Anniversary (2024) — plans the franchise through a fifth instalment; each entry is a standalone anthology with new characters and ghost.

• Han Sun-hwa (Eun-kyung) — BIFAN Actor Award; Gen MZ sincerity gives the social satire its most commercially accessible delivery vehicle.

• Hong Ye-ji (Ji-soo) — black magic club leader; charismatic student-side anchor.

• Lee Yeo-reum / WJSN Yeoreum (Saet-byeol) — big screen debut; joined after hearing from bandmate Eunseo about the welcoming set atmosphere on School Anniversary.

• Lee Hwa-won (Min-ji) — returning from School Anniversary; franchise continuity within the standalone structure.

The 4.5-minute sellout and the BIFAN double award confirm genre community adoption of the franchise as a priority event. Kim Min-ha’s five-film plan and the Whispering Corridors lineage give each entry a cultural heritage and a creative architecture that distinguishes the series from single-entry genre novelties.

Teaching Practice belongs to the Korean school horror-comedy tradition — directly invoking Whispering Corridors — but occupies its own register: the ghost is not an external intrusion but the exam system itself made literal and malevolent.

• The standalone anthology format makes each entry simultaneously a franchise continuation and a new-viewer entry point — the most commercially sustainable structure for a planned five-film series.

• The teacher-student power inversion — a trainee teacher protecting students from the system designed to evaluate them — is the franchise’s most formally specific evolution from the first instalment.

• The overbearing parent as a horror-comedy villain gives the genre its most recognisable and most personally resonant Korean social antagonist.

• BIFAN’s Korean Fantastic section is the primary institutional platform for Korean independent horror-comedy — its double award gives the franchise critical community recognition that theatrical circuits rarely provide for the format.

• The Whispering Corridors citation positions Teaching Practice within a prestige cultural lineage that immediately elevates the franchise’s institutional credibility for Korean critics and genre audiences alike.

• The 2023 teachers’ rights protest gave Kim Min-ha a specific political catalyst — the franchise’s social foundation is a documented crisis rather than a generalised observation.

• The private tutoring market’s displacement of public education is the film’s most structurally precise social target: the witch who empowers students supernaturally is the hagwon industry made grotesque.

• Han Sun-hwa’s Pilot momentum gives the franchise mainstream theatrical reach that School Anniversary’s student-only cast could not access.

• WJSN Yeoreum’s debut activates the K-pop crossover community that Korean genre cinema has consistently used as a discovery amplifier.

The core audience is 15–35 — BIFAN genre followers, Han Sun-hwa’s K-drama and film fanbase, and the WJSN community activated by Yeoreum’s big screen debut. The standalone anthology structure ensures accessibility for new viewers across all five planned entries.

The transition from student ensemble to teacher protagonist — with a BIFAN double award, a Cannes Film Market inclusion, and a planned five-film franchise — confirms that Teaching Practice is the structural and commercial evolution the series required to move from festival favourite to sustained theatrical franchise.

Kim Min-ha delivers measurable improvement across every metric — horror scale, comedy consistency, social commentary integration. The Whispering Corridors lineage gives the franchise cultural authority; the exam ghost gives it cultural specificity; Han Sun-hwa gives it commercial reach.

Works best for BIFAN genre followers, Han Sun-hwa’s established fanbase, and WJSN fans encountering Yeoreum’s big screen debut.

The exam ghost externalises what Korean students already experience — the franchise’s most precise and most culturally resonant formal argument.

Kim Min-ha’s tears at the BIFAN Q&A are the film’s most credible social signal — the horror-comedy is advocacy through genre, not exploitation of a crisis for entertainment.

The witch who gives students supernatural exam results is the private tutoring industry rendered grotesque — the franchise’s most formally specific and most socially pointed satirical invention.

Han Sun-hwa’s Eun-kyung — sincere, Gen MZ, physically committed — is the franchise’s commercial foundation. Hong Ye-ji’s Ji-soo anchors the student side with the charisma the black magic club requires.

Teaching Practice will be remembered as the instalment that gave the series its commercial foundation, its cultural lineage, and its social mandate simultaneously.

• BIFAN 2025: Korean Fantastic Film Award. Korean Fantastic Actor Award — Han Sun-hwa.

• 2025 Cannes Film Market. Kaohsiung Film Festival. Seoul Independent Film Festival.

• Korean theatrical May 13, 2026. Studio Santa Claus Entertainment distribution.

Teaching Practice confirms that the most formally precise Korean horror-comedy villain is already present in every student’s life — and that Kim Min-ha, following in the tradition of Whispering Corridors, understood this well enough to build a franchise around the moment a teacher finally fights back.

Teaching Practice earns its dual award and its theatrical release through a formal precision that distinguishes the best Korean genre sequels from the merely competent: escalating horror, more integrated social satire, and a commercial lead whose BIFAN recognition validates the franchise’s evolution from student ensemble to teacher protagonist. The third instalment, building on this entry’s critical and commercial foundation, will be the definitive test of whether the five-film plan can deliver on its full ambition.

• Movie themes: Teacher authority collapse in Korea, the college entrance exam as supernatural villain, the private tutoring market as the franchise’s true antagonist, and the teacher-student protective bond as its moral centre.

• Movie director: Kim Min-ha — School Anniversary (2024) — cites Whispering Corridors as direct inspiration; builds a standalone anthology franchise planned through five instalments; socially motivated by the 2023 teachers’ rights protest.

• Top casting: Han Sun-hwa’s BIFAN Actor Award confirms Eun-kyung as the franchise’s commercial foundation. Hong Ye-ji anchors the student ensemble. WJSN Yeoreum’s debut activates the K-pop crossover community. Lee Hwa-won returns from School Anniversary for franchise continuity.

• Awards and recognition: BIFAN 2025 Korean Fantastic Film Award and Korean Fantastic Actor Award. Cannes Film Market 2025. Kaohsiung Film Festival. Seoul Independent Film Festival. Korean theatrical May 13, 2026.

• Why to watch: The Korean horror-comedy that follows Whispering Corridors’ tradition, uses the college entrance exam as its supernatural villain, won the BIFAN double award, and was motivated by a director who cried at the Q&A because he genuinely cares about the teachers he is rooting for.

• Key success factors: Whispering Corridors cultural lineage plus Han Sun-hwa’s post-Pilot momentum plus BIFAN double award plus WJSN Yeoreum’s K-pop crossover plus Cannes Film Market exposure plus Kim Min-ha’s five-film franchise vision.

• Where to watch: Korean theatrical from May 13, 2026. Studio Santa Claus Entertainment distribution. International release pending.

Teaching Practice demonstrates that Korean independent horror-comedy can evolve from genre community event to sustained theatrical franchise without sacrificing the social specificity that gave School Anniversary its most distinctive quality. The Whispering Corridors lineage is the cultural foundation; the 2023 teachers’ protest is the social mandate; Han Sun-hwa’s BIFAN award is the commercial confirmation. Kim Min-ha’s third instalment will determine whether the franchise can sustain all three simultaneously through a full genre cycle.