City Busan Showbiz Latest News and Updates

Naman Ramachandran The Indonesian film industry is poised to spread its wings globally as the country’s filmmaking boom is the subject of a focus at the Busan International Film Festival. Films from the country now routinely get selected and win prizes at major international festivals. The local market in Indonesia, which has the fourth-largest population in the world with 277 million, is rapidly expanding with homegrown productions accounting for a significant share.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Taiwanese actors King Jieh-wen and Hsueh Shih-ling and Indonesia’s Angga Yunanda are set to star in “Malice,” a multinational Asian thriller that will shoot next year. The film’s producers, actors and government backers presented the fully-assembled package to press and industry on Monday at the Busan International Film Festival. The film, pitched as “a road movie at sea,” is a dark tale of three men who put out to sea in search of a particular, large swordfish that had been rumored to have died out.

Naman Ramachandran Bangladesh is a vital presence at the 2023 Busan International Film Festival with three films in competition and a film at the Asian Project Market. The current wave of Bangladeshi cinema was heralded by Mostofa Sarwar Farooki‘s “Television,” which closed Busan in 2012. The festival has subsequently screened almost every major work emerging from the country.

Naman Ramachandran After a three-year hiatus, the Jio MAMI Mumbai Film Festival is returning with a larger lineup and an expanded focus on South Asian cinema. The festival will feature 250 films including 40 world premieres, 45 Asia premieres and 70 South Asia Premieres.

U.S. producer E. Bennett Walsh, who has made films including Mortal Kombat, Meg 2: The Trench and The Kite Runner across the APAC region, says he’s got his eye on Japan and Korea as the next hot destinations for footloose Hollywood productions.

Taiwanese actors Jieh-Wen King and Hsueh Shih-Ling and Indonesian actor Angga Yunanda have been cast in Lim Lungyin’s action adventure Malice, an amitious co-production between Taiwan, Czech Republic and Indonesia.

Naman Ramachandran Hansal Mehta‘s Netflix series “Scoop” on Sunday won the prizes for best Asian TV series and best lead actress for Karishma Tanna at the Busan International Film Festival‘s 2023 Asia Content Awards and Global OTT Awards. The hard hitting crime drama series is based on journalist Jigna Vora’s 2019 memoir “Behind Bars in Byculla: My Days in Prison.” Tanna plays the lead role of Jagruti Pathak, a scoop-hunting journalist who is caught in the nexus of the police, the underworld and the media.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Big-budget, Korean-language fantasy-crime-action series “Moving” emerged as the big winner on Sunday at the Asia Contents Awards & Global OTT Awards, claiming six prizes, including the ‘best creative’ prize. The Disney+ original, which debuted in August, also received the best visual effects award and the best writer award, which was presented at the Busan Cinema Centre’s main stage to webtoon artist turned filmmaker Kang Full. Actor Ryu Seung Ryong, who portrayed a father with a superpower attempting to save his family, was awarded the best lead actor prize, while the show’s Lee Jung Ha was named best newcomer and Go Youn Jung was named best actress. The 20-episode series has received critical acclaim for its narrative structure, dynamic action sequences and breathtaking storytelling.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief EST N8, a recently-established finance, production and rights sales company, has added a Hong Kong remake of classic film “Tape” and the LGBT comedy-drama “ASOG” to its bulging sales slate at the AFCM market that accompanies the Busan Intenational Film Festival. “Tape” tells the story of three best friends who, following an event at a graduation party that transforms their lives, reunite 15 years later where a case of blackmail forces them to confront a terrible secret from their past. The original film starred Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman and Robert Sean Leonard and played at the Sundance, Toronto and Rotterdam festivals.In the Cantonese-language remake directed by Bizhan Tong, Selena Lee, Kenny Kwan, and Adam Pak play the contemporary characters while Mason Fung, Summer Chan, and Angus Yeung portray the characters’ younger versions. The script is written by Stephen Belber, Tong, Lee and Bonnie Lo, and is an adaptation of Belber’s own scripts from both the original film and stage play. The writers and director have significantly modernized the script to reflect advances in technology. Producers on the film include Tong, Lee and Belber.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief After making four documentary features about border conflicts, ethnicity, prostitution and human rights, Thai director Nontawat Numbenchapol picks up many of the same themes in his first fiction feature “Doi Boi.” The film, which premieres this week in the Jiseok competition section of the Busan International Film Festival, is the story of three young men living on the margins of society in Thailand and their common quest for justice. The characters are an illegal immigrant from Myanmar working, despite his own heterosexuality, as a gay prostitute in Chiang Main, a customer and an on-the-run political activist he is trying to help. The narrative takes in a large number of the social and political problems that have beset seemingly idyllic Thailand in recent years – undocumented workers, illegal immigrants fleeing the civil war in Myanmar, an oppressive political power structure, enforced ‘disappearance’ of those who the government’s political opponents and critics, police brutality – and traffic jams. “I was surprised to find so many immigrant men [from Myanmar’s Shan region] as sex workers in Chiang Mai.

Naman Ramachandran Sri Lankan auteur Prasanna Vithanage is back at the Busan International Film Festival with thriller “Paradise,” which is in the Jiseok competition. The film follows Indian couple – streaming content producer Kesav (Roshan Mathew, Sundance 2023 series “Poacher”) and blogger Amritha (Darshana Rajendran, “Hridayam”) – who are on vacation in Sri Lanka during the country’s ongoing economic crisis. They are the victims of a robbery and find themselves in the thick of the agitations.

Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP) has tweaked its incentive schemes for both international co-productions and offshore production, with the latter cash rebate being increased to 25% with the addition of a cultural bonus. 

Naman Ramachandran Distribution in Indonesia was the subject of a lively debate at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Contents and Film Market. With 277 million people, Indonesia has one of the largest populations in the world. However, geographically it is an archipelago and for its population, the country is under-screened with just 2,300 cinema screens.

Disney+ superhero series Moving was the big winner at Busan Film Festival’s Asia Contents Awards & Global OTT Awards, scooping six prizes, including Best Creative and Best Writer for Kang Full.

Naman Ramachandran The enduring popularity of the Asian LGBT and horror genres and the relationship with giant streamer Netflix were among the topics of discussion at a lively panel focusing on distribution at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Contents and Film Market. “I hate the fact that all the producers want to work with Netflix, it is also killing international sales as well. Because if all the big titles go to Netflix, it leaves very little room for independent distributors,” said Chen Shao-Yi, general manager at Screenworks Asia.

Naman Ramachandran The Film Development Council of the Philippines (FDCP) has added a 5% cultural bonus incentive to the existing 20% cash rebate that is part of the Film Location Incentive Program (FLIP), it was revealed at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Contents and Film Market. The cultural bonus will apply if the project showcases Philippines culture and heritage.

Bradley Liew of Epicmedia Productions (Philippines), Stefano Centini of Volos Films (Taiwan/Italy) and Singapore’s Huang Junxiang have reunited to launch two genre projects at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Contents and Film Market. The trio previously teamed on Sundance Midnight hit, “In My Mother’s Skin” by Kenneth Dagatan, which was recently ranked number six on Variety’s Best Horror Movies of 2023. The film was acquired by Amazon Studios and will stream on Prime Video from Oct.

Naman Ramachandran After his fiction feature debut, the absurdist satire “Eeb Allay Ooo!,” Indian filmmaker Prateek Vats is readying political comedy “Chronicles of a Confession.” The film is a selection at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Project Market. “Eeb Allay Ooo!” won big at the Mumbai Film Festival and went on to play at the Berlinale, Sao Paolo and Valladolid among many other festivals.

Salli,” a film which has its world premiere this week in the Busan International Film Festival’s A Window on Asian Cinema program. The Mandarin-, Taiwanese-, English- and French-language film follows a lonely middle-aged chicken farmer Hui-Chun, who doesn’t speak English and develops a romantic relationship through an app with a French man who calls himself Martin. In the online world, Hui-Chun is Salli.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Vietnam-based sales agent Skyline Media has unveiled five new titles for sales and distribution at the ACFN market that accompanies the Busan International Film Festival. They range from horror films to gay rom com series. “The Soul Reaper” is adapted from director-producer Thao Trang’s best-selling horror novel “Lunar New Year in Hell Village” (Tet O Lang Dia Nguc), and involves the happy occasion of a wedding turn darker after the arrival of a creepy stranger.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean sales agency Finecut has struck a raft of rights sales on upcoming fantasy-romance “Secret: Untold Melody.” The film, which will premiere at the upcoming Hawaii International Film Festival, tells the tale of a man whose promising piano career is cut short by a wrist injury. He returns to Korea and falls in love with a mysterious woman at his music college.

Naman Ramachandran The renaissance in Indonesian cinema is being celebrated at the Busan International Film Festival this year with 15 films, shorts and series being showcased. Hilmar Farid, Director General of Culture at Indonesia‘s Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology, is leading a 50-strong delegation of filmmakers, committee members and media to the festival. Variety spoke with Farid about the country’s boom and its upcoming opportunities and challenges.

Naman Ramachandran India’s Crawling Angel Films and Singapore’s Akanga Film Asia are teaming on Busan Asian Film School (AFiS) alumnus Aakash Chhabra’s feature directorial debut “I′ll Smile in September.” The film is selected at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Project Market. Akanga’s credits include Cannes winner “Tiger Stripes,” Locarno winner “A Land Imagined” and its “Oasis of Now” is in competition in the festival’s New Currents strand.

Naman Ramachandran “Where the Rivers Run South,” the Nepalese project at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Project Market, has received support from the Asian Cinema Fund’s script development pool. The film, which aims to tackle head on two timely issues in Nepal today – migrant labor and patriarchy – marks the feature directorial debut of Suraj Poudel, who previously served as editor on Cannes-winning 2022 short “Lori.” Poudel is an alumnus of Busan’s Asian Film Academy, where he won the Chanel X award for most promising filmmaker award in 2022.

Naman Ramachandran Celebrated Indian filmmaker Rima Das is at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Project Market with “Malati, My Love.” Like all of Das’ previous films, “Malati, My Love” is set in Assam, eastern India. It will follow Apurva and Malati who are happily married and madly in love, unabashed by what people in their small town think. When an unfortunate incident turns their lives upside down, in hardship, just as in love, they refuse to conform to societal norms.

Jessica Kiang One of the tiniest lived-in details in Bangladeshi writer-director Biplob Sarkar‘s debut feature — which is really a cluster of tiny, lived-in details — is the sheet of adhesive bindis that Kajal (a delightfully natural Ehan Rashid) snaffles from his mother’s dressing table. The bindis, or as they’re known in these parts, teeps, are worn by Banglasdeshi women of all creeds and religions, but along with an orangey-pink lipstick also taken from the dresser, for Kajal they represent more than mere cosmetic adornment.

Naman Ramachandran Korean powerhouse CJ ENM is set to continue its already extensive investment in Indonesia. The company will announce a slate of Indonesian films imminently. It is also planning to produce films and series that can be remade in other international territories, said Justin Kim, head of international productions at CJ ENM, which has production and distribution businesses in Indonesia.

Naman Ramachandran Producer Savita Raj Hiremath’s 2006 Bollywood cult classic “Khosla Ka Ghosla!” is being remade in the Telugu, Marathi and Kannada languages, it was revealed on the sidelines of the Busan International Film Festival’s Asian Contents and Film Market. Directed by Dibakar Banerjee and written by Jaideep Sahni, the Hindi-language film followed Khosla, a Delhi-based retired middle-class man who tries to get his land back from a swindling property dealer with the help of his sons and their friends. The Kannada version will be directed by Adarsh Eshwarappa (“Shuddhi”), the Telugu version by Vinod Anantoju (“Middle Class Melodies”) and the Marathi one by Kedar Shinde (“Baipan Bhari Deva”).

Seoul-based sales company Finecut has got off to a busy start at Busan’s Asian Contents & Film Market (ACFM) closing a trio of deals on webtoon adaptation Brave Citizen, and picking up international rights to inspirational drama Victory. 

Naman Ramachandran Celebrated Singaporean producer Jeremy Chua and emerging Philippines talent Rafael Manuel have teamed on “Filipinana,” a selection at the Busan International Film Festival‘s Asian Project Market this year. The film will follow 17-year-old girl Isabel, who spends her whole day teeing-up balls for golfers at a country club.