The annual Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) will open next month, featuring a rich lineup of films by rookie Asian directors and a diverse cohort of artists, the festival's organizers said Tuesday.
The 18th installment of the festival will be held at the Busan Cinema Center and seven other movie theaters in the southern port city of Busan from Oct. 3-12. Launched in 1996, the annual festival has grown to be the largest of its kind in Asia.
The Busan Cinema Center, built in 2011, will serve as the primary venue for the annual festival, with three movie theaters and a 4,000-seat outdoor performance hall also set to host BIFF-related events.
This year's festival will feature 301 movies from 70 countries around the world, slightly less than 304 films from 75 countries shown last year. They will include 95 world premiers and 42 international premiers, with more than 90 of them either debut or second films by newbie Asian directors.
The head juror of the New Currents segment, a competition section of the festival, is Rakhshan Banietemad, an Iranian director best known for "Nargess" (1991) and "The Blue Veiled" (1995).
But another competition section for non-Asian films last year, dubbed Flash Forward, will be a non-competition segment this year, according to festival organizers.
The Gala Presentation section will present six of the latest films by directorial masters from five countries including South Korean directors Bong Joon-ho's "Snowpiercer" and Kim Jee-woon's "The X."
The festival will offer a special retrospective of some 70 signature films by Korean cinematic master Im Kwon-taek, the winner of the 55th Berlin International Film Festival Honorary Golden Berlin Bear for his contribution to the advancement of Korean cinema.
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