named a part of the "Troika of the 1990s" in Korea along with her contemporaries Kim Hee-sun and Shim Eun-ha for their nationwide fame. In 1993, Kim leaded the main role in the film First Love and gained critical acclaim for her portrayal of the archetypal innocent girl, winning a Blue Dragon Film Award for Best Leading Actress and earning her the title "Nation's First Love" although the film was a box-office failure. 1999–2004: Development of her career Over two decades, she amassed a sizeable filmography of leading and supporting roles, notably in the television series Did We Really Love? with Bae Yong-joon and Revenge and Passion with Ahn Jae-wook, as well as the film Tie a Yellow Ribbon (1998). In the 2000s, Kim focused more on her career in film rather than television, featuring in Kick the Moon, YMCA Baseball Team and Three. At this time, she reinvented her image as a glamorous and confident femme fatale in Hypnotized (2004), 2005–2011: Revival by Tazza Kim's roles in The Red Shoes (2005) and Tazza: The High Rollers (2006) were her most recognised and entered her in the Korean film industry A-list. Various film roles followed, such as a housewife secretly dating a college student in A Good Day to Have an Affair; an unaffected aunt in Shim's Family; a prostitute in Eleventh Mom and a bar singer in Modern Boy (2008). She considers her collaboration with Han Suk-kyu in 2010's Villain and Widow as one of the highlights of her acting career. In 2009, Kim returned to television with Style, which is set in the fashion industry. She followed that with the mystery melodrama Home Sweet Home in 2010. A frequent host of film awards ceremonies and TV variety shows, Kim signed on as the host of MBC current affairs show W. Kim, an avid watcher of documentaries, was found by the production team to be a fit for the programme as that began to focus more on environmental and global issues. W with Kim Hye-soo premiered in July 2010, but was cancelled in October 2010, with Kim criticizing the network's decision. 2012–2015: Film success In 2012, she reunited with Tazza director Choi Dong-hoon in The Thieves. Set among the casinos of Macau, the heist film became one of the highest grossing films in Korean cinema history. Kim won Top Excellence Award, Actress in Film at 20th Korean Culture and