Busan 2023 Review: In CONCERNING MY DAUGHTER, LGBT and Generational-Divide Themes Drive Poignantly Acted Drama
The most promising title in this year's Korean Cinema Today-Vision program, the section dedicated to introducing new Korean filmmakers at the Busan International Film Festival, Concerning My Daughter follows a woman's uncomfortable relationship with her daughter's same-sex partner, who comes...
Busan 2023 Review: THAT SUMMER'S LIE, Teen Pregnancy Rears Its Complicated Head in Wry, Audacious, Surprising Debut
The lines between truth and fiction blur marvellously in the audacious New Currents competition title That Summer's Lie, the debut film of director Sohn Hyun-lok. Other slippery lines toed by this surprising tale include the one between childhood and adulthood...
Busan 2023 Review: WORK TO DO, Downsizing Drama Examines Moral Quagmire of Middle Management
Caught between professional duty and personal responsibility, a young man navigates through a maze of grey with a spinning moral compass in the compelling debut Work to Do from director Park Hong-jun. Jun-hee is a diligent young man, now in...
Busan 2023 Review: HERITAGE, Korea's Generational and Social Divides Under the Loop in Ruminative Indie
What sort of a world has the older generation left behind for the incoming one, how do they expect them to navigate it, and what do they anticipate in return? These questions and more concerning the uneasy ties that bind...
Busan 2023 Review: FAQ, A Young Girl's Surprising Journey Takes a Sci-Fi Turn
The intense and at times faintly ridiculous extremes of Korea's private education system are laid bare in the disarming fantasy satire FAQ. Morse code and Farsi language classes are just some of the things an elementary school girl is forced...
Busan 2023 Review: HOUSE OF THE SEASONS, Evocative Family Drama Introduces Us to New Visual Talent
Oh Jung-min channels Kore-eda Hirokazu's Still Walking in his lyrical debut House of the Seasons. The film chronicles several difficult seasons in the life of a rural family, as the pull between tradition and modernity threatens to tear them apart....
Busan 2023 Review: AT THE END OF THE FILM, Hypnotic if Overlong Snapshot of Korean Indie Sector in Crisis
Director Ahn Sun-kyoung returns with her fourth and most ambitious work, At the End of the Film, screening in the Jiseok competitive section at the Busan International Film Festival (BIFF), ten years after her terrific sophomore film Pascha won the...
Busan 2023 Review: RANSOMED, Overseas Korean Action-Comedy Bromance Hits the Right Beats
Kim Seong-hun and Ha Jung-woo, the director-actor combo who gave us Tunnel, reunite for the second time on the winning buddy action-comedy Ransomed, the latest in a series of high-profile films based on recent real-life stories featuring Korean characters gallivanting...
BECAUSE I HATE KOREA to Open 28th Busan International Film Festival
Following some struggles behind the scenes earlier this year, which resulted in a staffing reshuffle, the Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) will return next month with a sparkling program for its 28th edition. The festival will open on October 4th...
BiFan 2023 Review: INVISIBLE MAN, 80s Korean Genre Curio Delights with Its Sincere Heart and Cheesy Effects
Mix one part H.G. Wells, one part John Carpenter (Memoirs of an Invisible Man) and about a dozen parts 80s Korean cheese and you'll probably wind up with something resembling the charming Invisible Man, an endearingly lo-fi and utterly forgotten...
BiFan 2023 Review: SANA, Takashi Shimizu Returns with J-Pop-Infused J-Horror
Takashi Shimizu, the mastermind behind the Ju-On series (he also directed the first two American remakes) is back in familiar J-horror surroundings with his second film of 2023. Sana, serving as the closing film of this year's Bucheon International Fantastic...
BiFan 2023 Review: DOOR, Magnificent Home Invasion J-Horror Classic Makes an Impression
A nervous housewife gets a frightful visit in Banmei Takahashi's little-seen psycho-sexual J-horror gem Door. With flashes of giallo inspiration and memorable sound design, this marvellously entertaining 1988 production debuted internationally with a new 4K remaster at BiFan this year....
BiFan 2023 Review: HER HOBBY, Women Band Together in Topical Rural Revenge Drama
Two women band together against the patriarchy in the sun-drenched rural revenge drama Her Hobby, the feature debut of director Ha Myung-mi. Taking a big page out of the playbook of cult island revenge drama Bedevilled, though without the graphic...
BiFan 2023 Review: 2035, Korean Reunification Mockumentary Digs to Creepy Depths after Slow Start
The division of the Korean Peninsula has long fuelled the imagination of Korean cineastes and unlocked the purse strings of local viewers. Yet while we tend to remember the more bombastic titles, such as Joint Security Area and Secret Reunion,...
BiFan 2023 Review: ABROAD, Tourists Take in the Inhospitable Sights in Eerie and Engrossing Mystery
A Korean couple travel to Minnesota in search of the Northern Lights, only to come across eerier sights in the taut and engaging mystery Abroad. This debut feature film from Italian-born ad director Giovanni Fumu offers a smoother cultural cocktail...
BiFan 2023: 6 New Films to get Excited for at the 27th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival
The Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BiFan), Asia's finest bacchanal of genre cinema, is about to raise the curtain on its jam-packed 27th edition, which kicks off this Thursday with Ari Aster presenting Beau is Afraid for the first time...
BiFan Opens Folk Horror-Fuelled 27th Edition with Ari Aster's BEAU IS AFRAID
After weathering the pandemic and its shifting regulations for the past three editions, the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BiFan) returns to full strength this year with its 27th edition, kicking off on June 29 with the local premiere of...
Busan 2022 Review: SAGAL: SNAKE AND SCORPION, Gambling Loan Shark Documentary Makes for Addictive Viewing
Two years after the documentary Self-Portrait 2020, the best new Korean film at the 25th Busan International Film Festival, director Lee Dong-woo has returned to Busan with another long and engrossing portrait of a man whose addictions are causing his...
Busan 2022 Review: THE DREAM SONGS, Moving and Marvelous Portrait of Teen Friendship
For the past half a dozen years or so, some of the very best debut Korean films have chronicled friendships between young girls. Filled with the fleeting excitement of youth and the complex, mutable feelings that underpin the process of...
Busan 2022 Review: MOTHER LAND, Gorgeous Korean Stop Motion Animation Heads Out onto the Ice
Unlike Hollywood, France or Japan, Korea isn't known for any particular kind of animation. However, the country is overflowing with animators, and when not being outsourced to foreign productions, they churn out unique local films that each march to the...
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