UPRISING to Tear Open the 29th Busan Film Festival

Uprising, the highly anticipated period action film produced and co-written by Park Chan-wook, has been set as the opening film of this year's 29th Busan International Film Festival, which is set to open its doors on October 2. Closing the festival will be Eric Khoo's Singapore-France-Japan co-production Spirit World, featuring Catherine Deneuve.

A Netflix original, Uprising is directed by Kim Sang-man (Midnight FM) and stars Gang Dong-won (Secret Reunion) and Park Jung-min (Time to Hunt). It is is the most high-profile opening film selection at BIFF since the HK action-thriller Cold War, directed by Sunny Luk and Longman Leung, in 2012.

All told, this year's BIFF will screen 224 films from 63 countries, an 8% increase over last year, intruding a mix of major festival hits, Asian world premieres and retrospective titles.

This year's Asian Filmmaker of the year honoree will be celebrated Japanese filmmaker Kiyoshi Kurosawa. Both of his new films, Serpent's Path and Cloud, will be screened as gala presentations this year.

Among the big hitters at film festivals this year that will screen in Busan will be Sean Baker's Aurora, this year's Palme d'Or winner at the Cannes Film Festival, Jacques Audiard's Emilia Perez; Coralie Fargeat's The Substance and Jia Zhang-ke's Caught by the Tides, also from Cannes; Mati Diop's Dahomey, the Golden Bear winner from this year's Berlin International Film Festival; and Pedro Almodovar's The Room Next Door, which is competing for the Golden Lion at the ongoing Venice International Film Festival.

Speaking of big titles, Busan seems to be opening its door to more local commercial films than it has in the past. Beyond the big-budget opening film, BIFF will screen Bogota: City of the Lost with Song Joong-ki, and Jo Seon-ho's Hear Me: Our Summer with rising stars Roh Yoon-seo and Hong Kyung in their Korean Cinema Today - Special Premiere program.

BIFF's others stands this year will include a retrospective on Portuguese filmmaker Miguel Gomes, which will include his notable titles Tabu and Arabian Nights, a Teen Spirit, Teen Movie section focusing on the resurgence of coming-of-age films in Asia, and also an in memoriam section of the late actor Lee Sun-kyun, who will also be the posthumous recipient of this year's Korean Cinema Award.

As ever, the real stars of BIFF have yet to shine as the festival is rightly celebrated for shining a light on new filmmakers, who will begin to make their names following their Busan premieres.

Speaking of new independent voices, rising director Park Sye-young, who Screen Anarchy has been keeping its eye since his terrific debut The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra, will debut his new short film Memories. This year the prolific filmmaker has already premiered new films at all the major Korean film festivals, including the Jeonju International Film Festival (Twilight, short) and the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (Base Station, feature), as well as the Locarno International Film Festival (The Masked Monster, short) in Switzerland.

During this year's program launch announcement, new festival chairman Park Kwang-su, director of such Korean classic films as Chilsu and Mansu and A Single Spark, remarked on the festival's desire to both look to the future and return to the basics.

Busan is also keeping its eye on the "topics of the era", including streaming content and the rise of AI. Busan's Asian Contents and Film Market (ACFM) will host an AI-themed Microsoft booth in the market this year as well as an AI conference.

The festival will also reinstate several popular features which disappeared during pandemic editions. These include the return of the print edition of the daily BIFF magazine, the shuttle buses and the festival guest lounge.

Screen Anarchy is eager to return to Busan for this year's 29th edition, which will take place over October 2-11.