The $45 billion Terra disaster in 2022, including TerraUSD and LUNA, is set to die in a new South Korean independent film.
In “Crypto Man,” late actor Song Jae-rim stars as the main character and a self-styled business magnate who develops an altcoin named MOMMY. Jae-rim, a popular actor in South Korea, was found dead in a hotel room in November 2024, which police assumed was a suicide.
According to the Korean newspaper Jungang Daily, the new movie is inspired by the story of Terraform Labs.
Bombastic South Korean entrepreneur Do Kwon founded Terraform Labs, known for its TerraUSD (UST) stablecoin and companion LUNA token. Both assets collapsed in May 2022, wiping out $45 billion in market value overnight and sparking a chain of losses across the crypto world before being outlawed for years.
That means Do Kwon, who was arrested by authorities in Montenegro last year, joins the ranks of money criminals such as Jordan Belfort of “The Wolf of Wall Street” fame and Sam Bankman-Fried, immortalized in film and TV.
Director Harry Hyun told Korean newspaper JTBC that the film appears to show “the reality of youth addicted to stocks by day and coin speculation by night.”
Hyun didn't reveal much about the story, but said the main character “made an irreversible choice.”
The director, who won acclaim for her film Nine Times Fired at the Cannes Film Festival, said the upcoming film will have “elements of black comedy.”
The Terra film, distributed by MoAm Productions, is set to officially hit Korean theaters on January 15, 2025, with no word on an international release.
Since the film is based on true crimes, the sentencing process has not yet been completed, Hyun explained, “Legal advice was provided based on the legal issues prior to production.”
The dangers of the Crypto industry are getting the attention of filmmakers; At one point, it was confirmed that more than seven movies, documentaries and TV series were based on the story of the defunct crypto exchange FTX.
Most recently, in November 2024, Girls screenwriter Lena Dunham signed on to write the FTX tragedy after Apple and A24 bought the rights to the story.
Edited by Stacy Elliott.
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