Here's a fact viewers might not suspect after seeing Ha Ji Won fearlessly perform high-flying action stunts. She's afraid of heights.
And yet the 36-year-old actress does many of her own stunts. She refused to use a stuntwoman for the motorcycle riding scenes in the 2011 film "Sector 7." She scaled a vertical cliff for a commercial. That's her doing stunts on horseback with Ji Chang Wook in "Empress Ki."
And some of those drama and film stunts have resulted in injuries. She fractured her neck once and almost lost her sight another time. She sustained bruises while playing a boxer in the 2007 film "Miracle on 1st Street."
"I might have been a warrior in my past life," she once said.
She's pretty determined. In a recent interview by The Korea Herald, she said that once she chooses a film, she just does whatever it takes.
"I rarely regret the acting choices I made in the past," she said. "Because I am the one who choses them.
Nor does she worry whether the film will be a hit.
"The only thing I can do is to prepare copiously and diligently, all while thinking happy thoughts," she said.
She loves action films and has always tried her best at them, whether she was playing a stuntwoman in "Secret Garden" or a Joseon-era Charlie's Angel in the film "The Huntresses." She likes a challenge. And that may be why she has remained a success and is currently being courted by Hollywood.
Acording to her entertainment agency, Sun and Moon Entertainment, the actressis the first female Korean star to sign with The United Talent Agency, the Hollywood agency that represents Johnny Depp, Ewan McGregor, James McAvoy, Celine Dion, Nicholas Hoult, Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Radcliffe, Uma Thurman and Channing Tatum.
In her new film "Chronicle of a Blood Merchant," based on the Chinese bestselling novel by Yu Hua, Ha plays a mother for the first time. But she does not yet have any immediate plans for motherhood. Her character in the film had three boys and that sounds good, she says. So does having a daughter. But she is not in a hurry.
"I just like having fun,' she said. "I think that's where my passion comes from."
