The 17th Busan International Film Festival has begun in South Korea. This year, we’re seeing a significant increase in the number of participating Chinese films, directors and movie stars.
In Busan, South Korea’s most popular coastal city, more than 200,000 visitors are expected to be part of the exciting international film festival. Three-hundred-and-four films from seventy-five different countries will be played out in the local cinemas during the next 10 days.
And movies and celebrities from China are playing an integral part of the film festival this year.
At the Busan Cinema Centre on Thursday, Tang Wei, for whom this is her 3rd time attending the festival, co-hosted the opening ceremony with South Korea’s veteran actor Ahn Sung-ki. The Chinese star will be remembered as the first non-Korean emcee of the event.
Chinese beauties Zhang Ziyi and Cecelia Cheung walked the red carpet for their film “Dangerous Liasons”, which they filmed with South Korean actor Jang Donggun.
Hong Kong actors Tong Ka-Fai Leung and Aaron Kwok are here to promote their crime film “Cold War”, the first Hong Kong film to be selected as the Opening Film of the festival.
Tickets for “Cold War,” which is being played in front of a 4000 member audience behind me, were sold out in 94 seconds; a promising indicator of the movie’s popularity in South Korea.
According to the festival’s organizer, the increased presence of Chinese movies in Busan reflects the recent boom of the Chinese film industry.
Kim Ji-Seok, executive programmer of Busan International Film Festival, said, “Recently, the Chinese film industry has grown rapidly to become world’s number two since last year. So, a variety of new titles were released this year, which is why we invited a large number of Chinese guests to the Busan International Film Festival.”
Increased exposure of Chinese films and celebrities at one of Asia’s most significant international film festivals, will add wings to the Chinese film industry which is already on the rise.