A Tale of Two Film Festivals: Pusan and Rome

By Kim Tae-jong
Staff Reporter

There is no doubt that the Pusan International Film Festival (PIFF) has grown into one of the most important film festivals in the world. But that leading position means the festival has to deal with numerous challenges from other festivals.

The festival appears to have a strong new challenger _ the first Rome Film Festival, which begins this year only one day after PIFF kicks off on Oct. 12. The two festivals can't help but compete in inviting world premieres to their festivals.

"Many films were invited to the two festivals. We had to talk to the staff from the Rome Film Festival as well as directors who wanted to submit their work to an international film festival, and we were able to reach an agreement on the list of films", Kim Ji-seok, programmer of Asian films at PIFF, said during a news conference in Seoul on Sept. 12.

The negotiations ended up with satisfying results, as both festivals can now screen the same films, Kim added.

But when it comes to world-premieres, the negotiations were difficult.

Both festivals wanted to show the two films "After This Our Exile" by Hong Kong director Patrik Tam and "Nightmare Detective" by Japanese director Tsukamoto Shinya for the first time to moviegoers.

So that both festivals could show the films under the title "world premiere", they agreed to screen them on the same day with only few hours' difference.