Designed to sponsor Cinematheque, "Cinematheque Friends Film Festival", raises the curtain on January 15.
The festival in its 5th year will continue until February 28 at Seoul Art Cinema in Jongno-gu, Seoul.Movie directors, actors and industry representatives will choose the movies to screen during the festival and engage in talks with audiences.
More than 20 celebrities including directors
Park Chan-wook and
Jeon Gye-soo, actor
Ahn Seong-gi and movie critic Jeong Seong-il will attend the event.
The program line-up includes "Cinema Club" where aspiring movie directors can converse with star directors including
Bong Joon-ho and ...
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By Lee Hyo-won
Staff Reporter
Pushing limits, celebrating team spirit and savoring that delicious victory _ or honorable loss _ the classic sports drama is programmed to grip viewers with an adrenaline rush.
"Bronze Medalist", featuring weightlifting teenage girls, offers everything you expect from such a film, but also more.
South Korea is a country obsessed with first prizes, and Olympic silver and bronze medalists often hang their heads in shame for "letting down" fans. Last year's "
Forever the Moment" spotlighted the women's handball team's memorable silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics, and "Bronze" is about another relatively unpopular sport, weightlifting, which was virtually ignored until the 2008 Beijing Olympics catapulted Jang Mi-ran to superstardom with a gold medal and three world records.
"Bronze" is not a biography on Jang, but it could well have been. It is based on the true story behind the 81st National Sports Festival in 2000, when four of five girls from the same weightlifting team swept 14 golds and one silver out of 15 competitions. This record remains unbeaten to this day, and the girls, who practiced...
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By Lee Hyo-won
Staff Reporter
For its sixth omnibus feature film "
If You Were Me 4", the National Human Rights Commission of Korea has brought together five directors to capture the magic and complexities of being a teenager. The closing film for the 2008 Jeonju International Film Festival (JIFF) makes a promising theatrical release June 4 despite tough competition with big Hollywood flicks.
Along with JIFF's popular digital franchise, the human rights project continues to positively contribute to the omnibus genre. In past years, directors such as
Park Chan-wook participated ("If You Were Me", 2003), and this time
Bang Eun-jin,
Jeon Gye-soo,
Lee Hyeon-seung,
Yoon Seong-ho and
Kim Tae-yong each offer a small gem of a piece.
Bang, who debuted with the bloody thriller "
Princess Aurora", offers something bright in "Blue Birds on the Desk". The story itself is rather typical of 1990s TV dram...
MoreBy Lee Hyo-won
Staff Reporter
That special time of the year has come around, when South Korea's top filmmakers and actors turn into film festival programmers. The 4th Cinematheque Friends Film Festival will take place Jan. 29-March 1 in Seoul, and director
Park Chan-wook and some 20 other cineastes will meet with the audience to show and discuss 26 movies they have personally selected.
"I don't think there is a film festival like the Cinematheque Friends Film Festival anywhere else in the world", Park told reporters last week in Seoul. "Where else can you see all the representative cineastes ― directors, critics and stars ― gather in one place to introduce, watch and discuss old movies with fans?"
"Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans" (1927) by F.W. Murnau will open the festival. Actors
Kwon Hae-hyo and
Ye Ji-won will host the opening event at Cinematheque Seoul Art Cinema in Jongno.
The country's singular "cinema library" will transform into "The Cinematheque of Happiness", a venue for screenings and live conversation. Festival programmers have chosen classic Hollywood mo...
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