14th Pusan International Festival

Described as the Hub of Asian Cinema the fest will run from October 8 to 16 in Korea and this year these awards will be given.

New Currents Awards – given to two best feature films selected from works of new Asian directors in New Currrents.

Flash Forward Award – newly created this year in search for new cineaste beyond Asia by introducing the first or second works of young non-Asian directors.

Sonje Award – given to the best Korean and Asian short films in Wide Angle section.

PIFF Mecenat Award – first introduced in this year, is granted to the best Korean and Asian documentary films from Wide Angle section.

FIPRESCI Award – granted to a work among Asian directors
NETPAC Award – given to best Korean film either from New Currents or Korean Cinema Today sections.
KNN Award – Audience Award

New Currents Official Selection

This year’s ‘New Currents’ is featuring twelve films from 11 different countries.

Mardi ke gilass hayash ra khord (A Man Who Ate His Cherries), Payman Haghani, Iran, 2009
慢性中毒 Dead Slowly, Rita Hui, Hong Kong, 2009 (seems interesting, visually stunning!)
나는 곤경에 처했다! Naneun Konkyeonge Cheohaessda! (I’m in Trouble!), So Sang-min, Korea, 2009
Kick Off, Shawkat Amin Korki, Kurdistan and Iraq, 2008
伞 Lan, Jiang Wenli, China, 2009 (seems interesting)
Lost Paradise in Tokyo, Shiraishi Kazuya, Japan, 2009
Mundane History, Anocha Suwichakof, Thailand, 2009
My Daughter, Charlotte Lim, Malaysia, 2009 (interesting!)
Paju, Park Chan Ok, Korea, 2009
Squalor, Giuseppe Bede Samp, Philippines, 2009
True Noon, Nosir Saidov, Tajikistan, 2009
Vihir, Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni, India, 2009

As the section has quite interesting films here are the movies in the Flash Forward Official Selection.

The Loners, Renen Schorr, Israel, 2009
Bridges, Julian Giulianelli, Argentina, 2009
Chicago Heights, Daniel Nearing, Canada and USA, 2009 (gay interest)
Cosmonaut, Susanna Nicchiarelli, Italy, 2009
Dust, Max Jacoby, Luxembourg and Austria, 2009 (wow! Very interesting and probably gay interest)
Kino Caravan, Titus Muntean, Romania and Germany, 2009 (must be seen for me)
Last Cowboy Standing, Zaida Bergroth, Findland and Germany, 2009
Magma, Pierre Vinour, France, 2009
Miss Kicki, Hakon Liu, Sweden and Taiwan, 2009 (gay interest)
The Frost, Ferran Audi, Spain and Norway, 2008 (Bibi Anderson and Aitana Sanchez-Gijon, must be seen for me)
Zero, Pawel Borowski, Poland, 2009

Opening Film: Good Morning President, Jang Jin, Korea, 2009
Closing Film: The Message, Chen kuo-fu and Gao Qunshu, China, 2009

The festival has many more films in the following sections:

Gala Presentation
A Window on Asian Cinema (Vietnam’s Adrift will be shown here)
Korean Cinema Today – Panorama
Korean Cinema Today – Vision
Korean Cinema Retrospective
Ha Kil-chong, The Dreamer for New Cinema
Remembering Yu Hyun-mok
Archeology of Korean Cinema
World Cinema
Wide Angle (shorts and documentaries)
Open Cinema

If you want to check all the Special Programs in Focus and the Midnight Passion sections I suggest you use the links at the left of any of the above pages.

I spent a lot of time just browsing the sections plus reading about the movies in only two sections. This is a huge festival with many interesting films from Asia and all over the world.

Watch some trailers @ Movie On Companion