[2][3][4][5][6] By the late 1960s, Youn was a rising star in South Korea and won several awards for her role in Woman of Fire (1971).

Besides Woman of Fire and Minari, Youn is known for her work in the South Korean films The Housemaid (2010), The Taste of Money (2012), The Bacchus Lady (2016), and Canola (2016).

She is also known for her matriarch roles in the South Korean family drama series Men of the Bath House (1995), Be Strong, Geum-soon!

[14] Audiences found Youn's fast way of speaking and atypical appearance refreshing and she frequently took roles in TV dramas depicting a modern woman of the new generation, notably in Stepmother (1972) written by Kim Soo-hyun.

At the peak of her career, Youn retired after she married singer Jo Young-nam in 1974, then immigrated to the United States.

[15][16] Making a comeback after taking a long break was an unusual feat for a Korean middle-aged actress.

[14] Although most actresses her age played clichéd self-sacrificing mothers or coarse ajummas, Youn's acting range led to her being cast in more complex, stylish, and independent roles.

In A Good Lawyer's Wife (2003), she drew critical acclaim for her nonchalant acting as a mother-in-law who neglected her husband dying of liver cancer and enjoyed extramarital affairs.

She reunited with director Im Sang-soo for the fourth time in The Taste of Money (2012), as a cruel chaebol heiress at the center of the drama that unfolds and touches upon the themes of corruption, greed and sex.

Youn said "I don't mind being called an old actress, but I do worry about how to carry on my acting career without looking like an old fool.

[24] Youn starred in two leading roles in 2015: Kang Je-gyu's Salut d'Amour about the romance between an elderly supermarket employee and a flower shop owner,[25] and Canola about a Jeju Island female diver who reunites with her long-lost granddaughter.