"A Taxi Driver," a local box office hit about a pro-democracy uprising in the country, won best picture at the 38th annual Blue Dragon Awards, one of the nation's top two film honors, on Saturday.

The movie took home best film and best actor awards during the ceremony held at Kyunghee University in eastern Seoul.

Song Kang-ho was honored for his role as the eponymous Seoul taxi driver who takes the late German correspondent Jurgen Hinzpeter to the southwestern provincial city of Gwangju for a large offer of money and there witnesses the horrors of the bloody military crackdown on the pro-democracy people's uprising of May 1980. Hinzpeter, helped by the taxi driver, becomes the first western reporter to send out footage of the bloodshed.

The film sat on the box office throne for a long time, selling more than 12 million tickets after it opened in August.

Last month, it received the best picture and best planning awards at the 54th annual Daejong Film Awards, the other of the top two film prizes.

Na Moon-hee of "I Can Speak" was named best actress, while its helmer Kim Hyeon-seok received best director.

The best supporting actor and actress awards went to Jin Seon-gyu for "The Outlaws" and Kim So-jin for "The King."

Doh Kyung-soo, better known by his stage name D.O from boy group EXO, and Choi Hee-seo of the film "Anarchist from Colony"

were named best new actor and actress, respectively. The best rookie director award went to Lee Hyun-joo of "Our Love Story,"

while Hwang Dong-hyuk, the writer-director of "The Fortress," won best screenplay. (Yonhap)