Busan International Film Festival Readies Strong, Business-Oriented Edition, Despite Budget & Management Woes

Liz Shackleton
·7-min read

These are not easy times for film festivals, with many of the world’s largest buffeted by political and financial headwinds, and South Korea’s highly-regarded Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) has not been immune to the current instability.

Following last summer’s management turmoil, during which many of the festival’s founders and top executives quit, BIFF put interim leaders in place and achieved a level of stability for its October 2023 edition. Earlier this year, Park Kwang-su, a veteran filmmaker with long ties to the festival, was appointed as chairman. Ellen Y.D. Kim, also an industry veteran who has previously worked at BIFF and Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival, was appointed as head of BIFF’s industry platform, Asian Contents & Film Market (ACFM).

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But the recruitment process for a permanent festival director did not yield the desired results. With time running out for this year’s edition, former BIFF senior programmer Pak Dosin stepped in as co-deputy director, overseeing film selection and event planning, alongside Kang Seung-ah, who is responsible for corporate operations and budget management.

At the same time, BIFF has been hit by a big reduction in its public funding, as the Korean government slashed funding for the film industry and festivals by 50% last year. Despite this, the festival says it has managed to increase the number of screenings by 8% to 224 this year.

“We had a huge cut to this year’s budget, but we did receive additional financial support from Busan City Government and tried our best to secure more private sponsorship,” Pak Dosin explains. “We managed to find about ten additional sponsors this year. We also decided to not hold the forum event on our own this year to save budget.”

BIFF’s main sponsor is Chanel, which increased its contribution this year, while other major sponsors include BNK Busan Bank, luxury car brand Genesis and clean energy giant KHNP. In place of the academic forum that BIFF usually holds, the festival has lined up a more business-oriented programme with industry partners including Netflix, local studio CJ ENM and companies involved in the VFX and facilities side of the business.

“Industry people from big companies such as Disney, Netflix and Amazon come to Busan for the festival and we think this is a good opportunity for us to connect them to Korean and Asian filmmakers, especially talented newcomers,” says Pak. “We’re willing to work with them if they’re interested in discovering new talents and potential content from Asia and Korea.”

Netflix has a large presence at the festival this year. In addition to hosting the Creative Asia Forum on October 6, the streamer is behind BIFF’s opening night film, Uprising, co-written and produced by Park Chan-wook, which marks the first time a streaming title that will not be receiving a theatrical release has been selected to open the festival. Netflix is also launching three series selected for BIFF’s On Screen section and has several titles nominated for this year’s Asia Contents Awards & Global OTT Awards.

But Pak says this is not a signal that Busan is reducing its support for independent cinema and the theatrical ecosystem. “We introduced the On Screen section in 2021 as we thought drama series on streaming platforms are an extension of films and it would be a great opportunity for audiences to see those dramas on a big screen,” Pak says. “We’ve also screened a few films that are only available on streaming services, but these are a tiny portion of the whole selection of films.”

Indeed, BIFF’s line-up this year, as with previous editions, covers a wide range of independent and arthouse cinema from Asia, Europe and other regions, including titles from this year’s Berlin, Cannes, Venice and other festivals, as well as discoveries in its New Currents competition for Asian newcomers, and world premieres in the Jiseok competition for more established Asian directors.

Gala screenings this year include Cannes Best Director winner Grand Tour, part of a Special Program on director Miguel Gomes; Jia Zhangke’s Caught By The Tides; Patricia Mazuy’s Visiting Hours; and two films from Kiyoshi Kurosawa, this year’s Asian Filmmaker of the Year – Cloud and his French-language remake of his own Serpent’s Path.

Other Special Programs include ‘In Memory of Lee Sun-kyun’, featuring works of the late actor who died by suicide last year, and ‘Teen Spirit, Teen Movie’, screening recent Asian coming-of-age films including Tiger Stripes, City Of Wind, My Sunshine and Happyend.

BIFF also has several strong programs of Korean cinema – both mainstream and indie – and over its 29-year history has been the main platform for discovering these works. However, now that Korean content has gone global and much more accessible, the festival also plays a role in unearthing other Asian cinematic hotspots, with Southeast Asia currently one of the most vibrant.

“Busan has smartly positioned itself as a platform for discovering films from the fast developing Southeast Asian market,” says Derek Lui of Australia-based sales agent Odin’s Eye Entertainment, a long-time BIFF attendee. “With its focus on Indonesian films last year, it is becoming a hub to showcase, not only Korean and starry Asian commercial films, but also the exciting new wave of Southeast Asian cinema.”

<strong><em>Spirit World</em></strong>
Spirit World

Southeast Asia is represented at BIFF this year with titles including Brillante Mendoza’s Motherland in Jiseok and two entries in New Currents – Tale Of The Land, from Indonesia’s Loeloe Hendra, and MA – Cry Of Silence, from Myanmar’s The Maw Naing. The closing film, Eric Khoo’s Spirit World, hails from a Singaporean filmmaker, but is an international effort with co-producers in France and Japan and starring French actress Catherine Deneuve.

BIFF also has a firm commitment to European cinema and is this year screening more than 60 European titles, including eight from Gomes as part of the Special Program; several in the Icons and World Cinema sections, including Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez, Pedro Almodovar’s The Room Next Door and Magnus Von Horn’s The Girl With The Needle; and 11 titles in the Flash Forward competition, including two Europe-Africa co-productions – Mo Harawe’s The Village Next To Paradise and Rungano Nyoni’s On Becoming A Guinea Fowl.

Meanwhile, BIFF’s industry platform, the Asian Contents and Film Market (ACFM), is starting to attract a growing number of European sales agents. In years gone by, European sellers would only attend the market when they had films in BIFF selection, but now a growing number travel to Busan regardless. “We are mostly focusing on pre-sales this year, including our big monster film Kraken,” says Nicolai Korsgaard of Denmark’s Trust Nordisk. “ACFM covers a good portion of the Asian buyers and for us is a very effective and efficient market (see more on ACFM in this separate article).

While BIFF is more focused on Asia and Europe, the festival does not ignore US cinema, usually screening around 10-12 titles at each edition. This year, US titles include Sean Barker’s Cannes Palme d’Or winner Anora; Alex Thompson and Kelly O’Sullivan’s Ghostlight; and Jesse Eisenberg’s A Real Pain, while Alex Garland’s Civil War will screen in the outdoors Open Cinema section.

As for BIFF’s on-going management woes, Pak says the festival hopes to have this resolved by next year’s 30th anniversary edition. “After last year’s edition, we formed a special committee and held an open recruitment for a festival director twice, but things didn’t work out. We will do it again right after this year’s festival and I’m sure we’ll have a new festival director by early next year.”

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