Busan is good

9th Busan Inter-City Film Festival to Open on the 29th

내용

Busan Metropolitan City (Mayor Park Heong-joon) announced that the 9th Busan Inter-City Film Festival (hereinafter “the Festival”) will be held for three days from August 29 to 31 at the Cinematheque and Mousai Theater of the Busan Cinema Center.

The Festival is organized and hosted by the Busan Independent Film Association, with support from the City. Under the slogan Film People City, the Festival serves as a venue to showcase local films from UNESCO Creative Cities of Film around the world, as well as from Busan and other cities engaged in cultural exchange with the Association.

This year, a total of 11 cities will participate, including UNESCO Creative Cities of Film such as Galway (Ireland), Gdynia (Poland), Santos (Brazil), Yamagata (Japan), Potsdam (Germany), and Terrassa (Spain). Also joining are Quezon City (Philippines), dispatched under this year’s film production exchange program, as well as the Association’s partner cities Fukuoka (Japan) and Tainan (Taiwan). Together, they will present 30 short and feature-length films.

In addition, the Festival has expanded its international reach by starting exchanges with Cine Movement, an artist platform based in Singapore and Hong Kong, and Jumping Frames, an international dance video festival based in Hong Kong, making this year’s event more diverse and global than ever.

This year’s Festival will feature the special section Drawing City – Tainan, showcasing works on the themes of migration, labor, poetic boundaries, and landscapes in the southern Taiwanese city of Tainan.

Notably, Soh Yohen, an internationally acclaimed creator, will present his feature-length debut Park along with the documentaries The Hut, Dormitory, and Landscape Hunter. Soh has earned significant recognition, including the Grand Prize at the Taiwan International Documentary Festival, the Award for Artistic Contribution at the Amsterdam International Documentary Festival, and an invitation to the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival. During the Festival, he will visit Busan in person to participate in a cine-talk and forum.

Curated by Huang Joe, Artistic Director of the South Taiwan Film Festival, the forum Park Sensibility: Vividly Empty City will explore the vitality and emptiness of the place called “park.” In addition, four short films—Deer, Damn Bastards, Springtime, and Around That Time—will be screened, offering audiences a unique cinematic language that delves into Tainan’s marginalized history and colonial resistance through a literary sensibility. The forum will feature Soh Yohen and Oh Min-uk, Executive Director of the Festival, as panelists, with Lee Jeong-min, researcher at the Busan National University Film Institute, as moderator, providing a space to share the complex landscapes and sensibilities embodied by Tainan.

The Festival also includes a showcase of new works completed through the residency film production program supporting Busan creators. Director Kwon Yong-jin collaborated with local staff in Cannes to produce the feature film Bebe, while director Lee Sio worked with staff in Quezon City to produce the short film Homecoming. Both will premiere at the Festival.

In the Busan Section, works created by local directors inspired by people and landscapes of Busan will be presented. These include Mother and I by Choo Myeong-jwa, Looking at Love by Jeong Eun-joo, Busan Sonnet by Jeong Eun-seop, and Mijo by Shin Nari. Following the screenings, audience discussions with the directors will provide in-depth conversations on the background and production process of the films.

Online ticket reservations are available through the websites of the Busan Cinema Center and Mousai Theater. Detailed programs and schedules can be found on the Busan Independent Film Association website (indiebusan.com

) and its official social media accounts (instagram.com/indiebusan

).

Jo Yu-jang, Director General of Culture Bureau of Busan Metropolitan City, expressed hopes that the Festival will elevate Busan’s status as a UNESCO Creative City of Film and offer citizens the opportunity to experience the diverse appeal of both local and international cinema.