At the 14th annual Beijing International Film Festival, "Exhuma" is scheduled for five screenings beginning on April 20th and ending on April 27th. Tickets went on sale this past April 15th for the festival which will begin on April 18th. And for "Exhuma" at least, tickets are already unavailable. This is not typical for films at the festival at large this year- "Exhuma" is not even in an awards based section. Nevertheless, interest in the occult horror film is quite high in China.
The somewhat surprising news comes as "Exhuma" has faced some controversy internationally for featuring characters with Chinese characters seemingly tattooed on their bodies at random. Of course, "Exhuma" itself does provide an explanation for what these characters are, and the explanation eventually becomes relevant to the story's main conflict. It is unclear how many people in China proper are offended by this, however, with much penetration of this talking point being in English.
"Exhuma" is not the only South Korean film screening at the Beijing International Film Festival. "A Traveler's Needs" from Hong Sang-soo will also screen there. "Picnic" and "It's Okay!" and "Work to Do" are the other three South Korean films screening there for a total of five. "Exhuma" and "A Traveler's Needs" and "It's Okay!" screened at the Berlin International Film Festival earlier this year, while "Picnic" and "Work to Do" appeared at the Busan International Film Festival last year.
The large number of South Korean films at the Beijing International Film Festival this year may represent a thawing of relations between South Korea and China since the THAAD controversy in 2017. Since then, "Oh! My Gran" was the only South Korean film to appear the Beijing International Film Festival. "Exhuma" has had 11,634,243 admissions since it premiered at the South Korean box office on February 22nd.
Written by William Schwartz
Staff writer. Has been writing articles for HanCinema since 2012, having lived in South Korea since 2011. Started out in Gyeongju, then to Daegu, then to Ansan, then to Yeongju, then to Seoul, lived on the road for HanCinema's travel diaries series in the summer of 2016, and is currently settled in Anyang. Has good tips for utilizing South Korea's public bus system. William Schwartz can be contacted via william@hancinema.net. He also has a substack at williamschwartz.substack.com where he discusses the South Korean film industry in broader terms and takes suggestions for future movies to review.
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