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Korean auteur Hong Sangsoo‘s latest Berlinale competition entry “What Does That Nature Say to You” has secured distribution deals across multiple territories, Seoul-based sales agent Finecut has revealed. The film has been picked up by Arizona Films (France), Ama Films (Greece & Cyprus), Minerva Pictures (Italy), L’atalante Cinema (Spain), Cola Films (Taiwan) and The Cinema Guild (U.S.).

Hong’s minimalist drama, which follows a young poet who spends a day with his girlfriend’s family, marks the director’s 12th film to screen at the Berlinale. The pic stars Ha Seongguk and Kwon Haehyo.

According to Finecut, the film’s world premiere in Berlin was met with laughter and enthusiasm, with Hong’s signature subtle humor resonating strongly with audiences and international buyers alike.

The prolific filmmaker has become a Berlinale darling in recent years, collecting an array of Silver Bear awards. Hong won the Silver...

What Does That Nature Say To You by prolific South Korean auteur Hong Sangoo has secured distribution in key European territories following its premiere in Competition at the Berlinale.

Sales agent Finecut has closed deals for France (Arizona Films), Italy (Minerva Pictures) and Spain (L’atalante Cinema) as well as Greece and Cyprus (Ama Films). The film has also been picked up for Taiwan (Cola Films), having previously been sold to the US (The Cinema Guild).

The story centres on a young poet who drops off his girlfriend at her parents’ impressive home and bumps into her family, leading to...

On the heels of its premiere in competition at the Berlin Film Festival, Hong Sang-soo’s “What Does That Nature Say to You” has found U.S. distribution with Cinema Guild.

The movie marks the prolific South Korean director’s 33rd movie and follows an impressive streak of six consecutive years at the Berlinale.

Cinema Guild, which recently collaborated with Hong on his previous film “A Traveler’s Needs,” will release “What Does That Nature Say to You” in theaters in the U.S. later this year. Produced by Jeonwonsa Film, the fim is represented internationally by Finecut.

“What Does That Nature Say to You” follows Donghwa (Ha Seongguk), a fledgling poet in his thirties who rejects material aspirations and seeks to lead a life dedicated to truth and beauty. On a lazy afternoon, he drives his girlfriend, Junhee (Kang Soyi), back to her parents’ home outside Seoul. In the driveway,...

The Hong Sangsoo universe has always orbited artists of one stripe or another — wandering filmmakers, poets, and other writers, some more erratic than others. A recurring theme is the serenity and emotional salve that art can provide, along with an alternative to more ordinary, well-traveled roads through life. But in What Does That Nature Say to You, Hong takes a hard look at the artistic pursuit and at sincerity in relationships, with a seemingly straightforward story that has a bit of a sting in its tail.

The opening scene has a charming ambiguity: a man and a woman sit in a car parked at the side of a road, as if it’s the shy farewell at the end of a date. In fact, Donghwa (Ha Seongguk) is dropping off his girlfriend, Junhee (Kang Soyi), at her family’s home after a long drive. Impressed by the big house Donghwa joins her for an impromptu visit. And in the serendipitous manner of Hong’s films, a “meet the parents” scenario soon gets underway.

Part of the appeal of Hong’s deftly scripted films is being in the moment with characters who, beyond perhaps some vague idea of taking a trip, seem to be reacting on the fly with a beguiling openness. That organic quality can wear on those who (for some odd reason) have gone to a Hong film expecting a plot that moves like clockwork, and What Does That Nature Say to You does hold its cards close. For a long time, Donghwa is simply getting to know Junhee’s father (Kwon Haehyo), a friendly man who is full of kind words for his daughter’s boyfriend (and even his beat-up 1990s car).

Donghwa is a poet by profession, as he keeps saying, and that delights Junhee’s father, whose wife (Cho Yunhee) also writes poetry. Junhee’s family is well off — her father apparently owns the hill where the house sits — and there’s an echo of the class undertones in Hong’s A Traveler’s Needs, in which Kwon Haehyo played an affable, wealthy man with a fondness for music (and a wife who’s a bit skeptical of their visitor). Gradually Donghwa’s hang-time with the girlfriend’s fam starts to show small signs of strain during an outing to a temple and restaurant, and then a home-cooked chicken dinner.

The problem is that Donghwa’s life as a thirtysomething poet begins to look less and less substantial, maybe more of a lifestyle choice than a full-fledged calling. Junhee’s homebody sister keeps pointing out, with some satisfaction, that Donghwa has a fallback plan because his father is a wealthy attorney. The sort of sentiments that sound like bohemian wisdom in other Hong movies have a try-hard ring from Donghwa: “A life spent pursuing beauty is good … right?” he says, as if reassuring himself as well. When he prostrates himself at the memorial tree for Junhee’s grandmother, the gesture impresses her father, but again, it’s a bit much.

Hong has never been above puncturing the pretensions of his shambling artist characters, but it’s striking how the family’s open-hearted welcome eventually pales before Junhee’s mother’s doubts at the dinner table. Hong again employs the long table-time takes that have witnessed the mortification of so many drunken characters, this time skewering Donghwa. But in the process we come to understand the father’s initial sincere embrace as a real form of trust, one that is granted but can also be withdrawn. These parents might love poetry but they’re also vetting their daughter’s suitor, and their hilariously withering post-dinner evaluation shows they are not naive.

But before that, this multi-chapter film unfolds for so long as a relatively mild encounter between the young couple and her family that one keeps wondering when the other shoe will drop. Unlike some of Hong’s trickier narrative schemes, the visit unfolds in a linear manner over just about 24 hours. Given Donghwa’s increasingly apparent unremarkability, the story coasts for a while on the family’s subtle interplay: the subtle passive-aggression among the sisters (as Junhee gets increasingly frustrated with her boyfriend), and the way the warmth of Hong all-star Kwon Haehyo prevails until Cho Yunhee cuts in with motherly reality checks.

It’s all a big contrast to the portrayal of the older poet in Hong’s In Our Day, a lone but lionized figure who happily tipples the afternoon away. Donghwa might not even have the chops for his chosen career, judging from reactions to his poetry. In the end, What Does That Nature Say to You lands as a quietly bruising portrait in failure, not lacking in compassion but also not indulging in easy romantic illusions.

Title: What Does That Nature Say to You (Geu jayeoni nege mworago hani)

Festival: Berlin (Competition)

Director-screenwriter: Hong Sangsoo

Cast: Ha Seongguk, Kwon Haehyo, Cho Yunhee, Kang Soyi, Park Miso

Sales agent: Finecut

Running time: 1 hr 48 mins...

CinemAsia Film Festival 2025 presents its full program for the 17th edition, running March 6-11 in Amsterdam. Featuring 38 handpicked films – of which 27 feature films and 11 shorts, including 1 world and 4 European premieres – the lineup spans blockbusters, art-house gems, and independent productions.

Hosted at Eye Filmmuseum, Studio/K, Rialto De Pijp, and Rialto Vu, CinemAsia invites audiences on a cinematic journey through Asia’s rich storytelling, stunning visuals, and diverse cultural perspectives.

Grand Opening & Closing Films

Opening Film – Happyend by Neo Sora (Dutch premiere) – Director present at the festival.

The festival opens with the highly anticipated Happyend by Japanese-American filmmaker Neo Sora. Set in a dystopian near-future Tokyo overshadowed by an impending catastrophic earthquake, this visually stunning film explores identity and friendship in a world dominated by control and uncertainty.

Closing Film – Fly Me To The Moon (Hong Kong 2023) by Sasha Chuk (Dutch premiere) – Director present.

CinemAsia 2025 closes with Fly Me to the Moon,...

South Korean sales outfit Finecut has closed a raft of key deals for thriller A Girl With Closed Eyes ahead of its market premiere screening at the European Film Market (EFM).

The film, which stars Minha Kim from Apple TV+ series Pachinko, has been acquired for Japan, Poland (Media4Fun), Taiwan (Cola Films), Vietnam (Aeonbeta) and Cis (Red Castle Group) ahead of Berlin.

The story centres on a murder suspect and a detective with a shared past, reunited through the killing of a bestselling author, where hidden truths are uncovered as the investigation deepens.

Kim, who has secured several award nominations...

The 75th Berlin International Film Festival (February 13-23) has unveiled the 19 titles set to play in its official Competition and films selected for its new competitive Perspectives strand.

Scroll down for full list

New films from Richard Linklater, Hong Sangsoo, Michel Franco and Radu Jude are among those selected for the main competition, with stars including Margaret Qualley, Ethan Hawke, Jessica Chastain, Claes Bang and Marion Cotillard.

It marks the first Competition lineup from new festival director Tricia Tuttle, who announced the titles alongside co-directors of film programming Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz in Berlin today (January 21).

All Competition titles...

The 75th Berlin International Film Festival (February 13-23) has unveiled the 19 titles set to play in its official Competition and films selected for its new competitive Perspectives strand.

Scroll down for full list

New films from Richard Linklater, Hong Sangsoo, Michel Franco and Radu Jude are among those selected for the main competition, with stars including Margaret Qualley, Ethan Hawke, Jessica Chastain, Claes Bang and Marion Cotillard.

It marks the first Competition lineup from new festival director Tricia Tuttle, who announced the titles alongside co-directors of film programming Jacqueline Lyanga and Michael Stütz in Berlin today (January 21).

All Competition titles...

Following The Film Stage’s collective top 50 films of 2024, as part of our year-end coverage, our contributors are sharing their personal top 10 lists.

The best film I saw in 2024, Alain Guiradie’s new masterpiece Misericordia, will sadly not be on the list you see below—such are the quirks of film distribution. Its distributors, Sideshow and Janus Films will release it next year. Thus, it must wait 12 months to occupy the top spot it richly deserves—which it will—barring a profusion of filmmaking genius in 2025.

Even so, the films that did reach U.S. screens in 2024 provided several highlights. An extraordinary, unprecedented occurrence was the sudden and rare elevation of Indian filmmaking to the most hallowed stages of world cinema. Payal Kapadia made history with All We Imagine As Light, the first Indian film to be selected in the Cannes Competition in 30 years. Perhaps its French origins helped, but...

Illustration by Stephanie Lane Gage.While working on this list and thinking about why my favorite posters stand out from the thousands of others made each year, I came up with one simple maxim: a great idea beautifully executed. There are plenty of good movie posters out there that do the job they need to do; they tell you what the movie is and make you want to see it. Does a new blockbuster like Wicked need an especially clever poster? No. It needs to tell you that it is Wicked, that Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo are in it, and it needs to look luxe. But the posters that I love best go above and beyond mere glossy functionality. They have a smart concept that is about more than just showing and telling, and they execute it perfectly, down to the placement of every piece of type and every...

Starting small on two screens but with surprising spring is animated Flow from Sideshow and Janus Films, setting the distributor’s highest per screen average of circa $25.4k, or $50.8k at two theater in NY and LA. Gints Zilbalodis’ feline tale, Latvia’s Oscar submission, was the top grossing film at NYC’s Angelika and third highest at LA’s AMC Burbank behind multiple screens of Gladiator 2 and Wicked. Sellouts were driven by families, fans of Studio Ghibli films or the Coraline re-release on weekend afternoons, to young adults.

The tale of a courageous cat after his home is devastated by a great flood, Flow is generating buzz as a film that could be nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars as well as being the first Latvian film in history to be nominated for Best International Feature.

Premiered at Cannes and sits at 98% with critics on Rotten Tomatoes.

It’s a quiet but quality indie weekend led by documentaries and a few features in limited release as Gladiator 2 and Wicked storm in, other independents hold over, and ahead of anticipated specialty debuts next week like Queer, The Seed Of The Sacred Fig and Maria.

Docs out today follow artists in Ukraine, women in Afghanistan, South African photographer Ernest Cole and Amichai Lau-Lavie, a gay Israeli descendant of rabbis who becomes one himself. Narrative features include Hong Sangoo’ A Traveler’s Needs, animated Flow and The Black Sea.

Porcelain War from Picturehouse, the Sundance Grand Jury/U.S. Documentary Award winner that just screened at Doc NYC, opens at NYC’s IFC Center. Filmmakers Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev and participant Anya Stasenko are on hand for Q&As with award-winning producer Paula DuPré Pesman.

Set amid the chaos and destruction of Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, the...

The Traveler Has Come: Huppert Shines in Latest Collaboration with Sang-soo

There are few directors who seem to rightly channel the comic side of Isabelle Huppert’s unique strangeness than the perennial Hong Sang-soo. Having worked together on the lovely In Another Country (2012), in which she stars as a quartet of different foreign women in South Korea, and the slight lark Claire’s Camera (2017), they’ve united once again for an equally delicate venture, A Traveler’s Needs. Once again, Huppert is a stranger in a strange land as a woman who has her own unique way of teaching French to a growing clientele of Korean women and enjoys having a few drinks.…...

“In Another Country,” “Claire’s Camera,” and now “A Traveler’s Needs” — Isabelle Huppert and Hong Sang-soo are three for three in conjuring one of contemporary cinema’s most psychically in-sync pairings. Hong, who has directed more than 30 films dating back to his 1996 debut “The Day a Pig Fell into the Well,” is a tireless achiever and one could say workaholic at the level of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, often releasing two films a year. While the sun-dappled and deceptively light “A Traveler’s Needs,” his loveliest and funniest film in years, debuted at the Berlinale in February, Hong already had “By the Stream” heading for Locarno this past summer.

In “A Traveler’s Needs,” which shot in under two weeks on location in Seoul, Huppert plays a drifting tourist named Iris who funds her walkabout by teaching French and piano lessons to locals. She gets by on the largesse of others — including a younger man she’s staying with,...

Just when you thought you knew what to expect from Hong Sang-soo, South Korea’s most prolific auteur has crafted his funniest film in years with his 31st feature, “A Traveler’s Needs.”

This delightfully mischievous comedy, winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Berlin back in February, marks Hong’s third collaboration with Isabelle Huppert following 2012’s “In Another Country” and “Claire’s Camera” both released in 2017. To round off that unlikely triptych, the pair embark on an adventure without purpose, or so it would seem as we follow a French woman named Iris as she wanders adrift through Seoul in search of who knows what. For long stretches of time, Iris practices the recorder (badly) in community parks or sits alone, savoring her beloved Korean rice wine, aka Makgeolli, in between bites of bibimbap. Of the titular needs this traveler requires, money ends up being one of them, so she turns to teaching French,...

American director, screenwriter and producer Todd Haynes has been named president of the international jury of the 75th Berlin International Film Festival. The Berlinale diamond jubilee (a 75th anniversary) will take place from February 13-23, 2025.

”Todd Haynes is a dazzlingly gifted writer and director with an impressive range; his body of work is at once stylistically versatile but also unmistakably his,” Berlinale Director Tricia Tuttle said in a Thursday statement. “Ever since his debut feature ‘Poison’ won the Teddy Award in 1991, the Berlinale has followed and loved his filmmaking, and we are overjoyed to have him join the festival as the President of the International Jury for our 75th edition.”

The Teddy Award is the festival’s queer-film prize. “Poison” also won the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. Haynes’ 2002 film “Far From Heaven” was nominated for four Oscars.

His other notable work includes “Safe” (1995), “Velvet Goldmine” (1998), the...

The Institute of Contemporary Arts (Ica) has acquired UK-Ireland distribution rights to Hong Sangsoo’sBy The Streamfrom Finecut.

By The Streamfollows a lecturer who persuades her uncle to direct her school’s theatrical skit, only for a scandalous incident involving students to throw them both into trouble.

The film debuted at Locarno Film Festival in August, going on to play Melbourne, Toronto, New York and Chicago.

The Ica, which distributes films as well as running its central London cinema, will release By The Stream in UK-Ireland cinemas on January 31.

Hong is director, writer, producer, composer, cinematographer and editor on the film,...

When the Berlin International Film Festival returns for its 75th ceremony in 2025, it will be doing so without any official footprint on X.

That’s because the German movie festival just revealed its intention to exit the social media site formerly known as Twitter by the end of the year.

“The Berlinale has decided to say goodbye to X on Dec 31, 2024. Thank you for following us here all these years,” organizers shared on X on Monday. “Stay connected with all things Berlinale on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and our website. See you there!”

The Berlinale has decided to say goodbye to X on Dec 31, 2024. Thank you for following us here all these years. Stay connected with all things Berlinale on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and our website. See you there! #Berlinale pic.twitter.com/ZpsXM2d3DO

— Berlinale (@berlinale) November 4, 2024

The festival did not give any specific reason for its...

For his first feature of two features this year, Hongsangsoo made a long-awaited reunion with Isabelle Huppert. Following In Another Country and Claire’s Camera, the duo teamed up again for A Traveler’s Needs, one of the prolific director’s best in years. Winner of the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize at Berlinale, Cinema Guild will now release the film on November 22 beginning at Film at Lincoln Center and the new trailer has arrived.

Here’s the synopsis: “A comedy of improbable encounters and unlikely language lessons, A Traveler’s Needs marks the third collaboration between Hong and Huppert (following 2012’s In Another Country and 2017’s Claire’s Camera). This time Huppert plays Iris, a woman who finds herself adrift in Seoul and without any means to make ends meet, turns to teaching French via a très peculiar method. Through a series of encounters, as we grow to know more about Iris and her situation,...

The fizzy, milky Korean rice wine makgeolli is as much a main character as Isabelle Huppert in Korean filmmaker Hong Sangsoo‘s third collaboration with the iconic French actress. In fact, her character in “A Traveler’s Needs” can’t make it through the day without having at least a few glasses.

“A Traveler’s Needs” stars César winner Huppert as a tourist drifting through Seoul who, with no money of her own and only a few jaunty sunhats and colorful cardigans, takes to teaching French to the locals to pay her room and board. But her unorthodox approach both alienates and entrances those around her in the latest delicate comedy from Hong, where characters booze and smoke their way through their ennui without ever succumbing to soul-crushing misanthropy. Watch the trailer for “A Traveler’s Needs,” an IndieWire exclusive, below.

Here’s the official synopsis: “A comedy of improbable encounters and unlikely language lessons,...

Madrid-based distributor Atalante is ramping up its heritage cinema titles in Spain, where it’s set to release Vera Chytilová’s 1966 Czechoslovakian dark comedy “Daisies” and Kavery Kaul’s 1988 calypso music documentary “One Hand Don’t Clap.”

“Daises,” which Atalante is releasing in November, “is maybe one of the most iconic modern European films that we are very proud to put in theaters,” Atalante CEO Ramiro Ledo Cordeiro told Variety at the Lumière Film Festival’s International Classic Film Market (Mifc) in Lyon, France.

While the company had previously released one or two heritage films a year, 2024 saw an extraordinary number of releases, Ledo added.

Indeed, Atalante’s releases this year included the 4K restoration by Toho of Yasujiro Ozu’s 1950 Japanese drama “The Munekata Sisters,” which premiered last year in Cannes; the new restoration of Martha Coolidge’s 1975 U.S. drama “Not a Pretty Picture,” a reconstruction of sexual...

Over the last decade, companies like Netflix, NBCUniversal and Cinelease have committed an enormous amount of capital to filming in New Mexico. That development, along with attractive tax rebates from the state, has enabled Santa Fe to blossom into an enviable production hub.

The combination of that growth and a forward-thinking creative community has also helped generate a unique, on-the-rise energy to the Santa Fe International Film Festival, which in 2024 earned a place on Moviemaker Magazine’s list of “50 Film Festivals Worth the Entry Fee” for the second year in a row.

Nestled in the foothills of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, the festival offers up a rare mixture of natural beauty, professional networking opportunities for up-and-coming artists, and superbly curated programming. Returning for its 16th edition October 16-20, this year’s theme is identity and collective humanity — exploring what makes a person distinct while also binding them to one another.

Watching “Babygirl” at the Venice Film Festival, I thought, “Isabelle Huppert is going to like this.” Here is a provocative movie, directed by Halina Reijn, starring Nicole Kidman as a corporate CEO engaging in kink and sexually submitting herself to a younger intern (Harris Dickinson). Kidman’s Romy cuts a powerful silhouette in the office by day, but by night, she’s on all fours being dominated in increasingly adventurous sexual encounters.

With Huppert as jury president, it was no surprise when Kidman won Best Actress, as Huppert famously stars in the darkly perverse “The Piano Teacher,” a movie Reijn’s script is surely in deep conversation with. In the 2001 Michael Haneke film, Huppert played a stoic music instructor who becomes sexually overpowered by a younger pupil. I went into “Babygirl” expecting the American version of “The Piano Teacher,” though Reijn’s film is more buoyantly sex-positive than sinisterly Freudian.

The Mami Mumbai Film Festival, one of Asia’s premier cinematic events, returns for its 2024 edition from October 19–24, bringing an electrifying lineup of films and cultural experiences. This six-day celebration of global cinema will feature over 110 films from more than 45 countries, with works presented in over 50 languages across a variety of lengths and genres, all part of the festival’s Official Selection. The highlight of the festival is the South Asia Competition, which spotlights the most groundbreaking contemporary films from South Asia and the South Asian diaspora, showcasing this year’s most outstanding cinematic achievements.

Mami 2024 will open on October 19th with Payal Kapadia’s debut fiction feature All We Imagine as Light, setting the tone for the festival. The grand finale on October 24th will feature Anora, the 2024 Palme d’Or winner, closing the event on a high note.

This article offers a curated list of 25 must-watch titles for this festival season,...

The upcoming 2024 London Film Festival will feature an array of films from renowned directors around the world. Festival organizers have crafted a lineup that includes international stories on important issues as well as biopics of iconic figures. Films showcasing both new and veteran talents from genres like drama, historical fiction, and surreal experiences will be part of the event.

One of the most anticipated premieres is Pedro Almodóvar’s English-language debut film “The Room Next Door.” Starring Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton, the film explores human connection during a moment of crisis. Almodóvar recently won the Golden Lion award for the film at the Venice Film Festival. Festival organizers described the film as examining “the complexities of human connection.”

Acclaimed British filmmaker Steve McQueen will debut his new historical drama “Blitz” about London during World War II. The film follows a woman, played by Saoirse Ronan, searching for her missing son amid German air raids.

Hard Truths

Scheduled to take place in England’s capital from the 9th to the 20th October is the 2024 edition of the London Film Festival. The UK’s premier film celebration will be taking over the city with screenings at a whole host of London-wide venues including the BFI Southbank, BFI IMAX, Prince Charles Cinema and Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall to name but a few. As it has done for a number of years now, the festival will also be presenting a number of select screenings in regional cinemas too as part of Lff on Tour. For those who aren’t able to make it to cinemas there will be a number of films, of both feature and short length, made available for free on the BFI Player once the festival gets underway.

The lineup of feature films on offer has once again excited us here at Dn headquarters.

Isabelle Huppert joked that the 13-day shoot of Hong Sangsoo’s A Traveler’s Needs was “a super-production” by the Korean filmmaker’s usual standards.

The actor and director’s two previous collaborations, Claire’s Camera and In Another Country, took six and nine days to shoot, respectively, she recalled. Huppert was speaking onstage at the New York Film Festival with fest Artistic Director Dennis Lim, about A Traveler’s Needs. The film, which won the Silver Bear Grand Jury Prize in Berlin last February, had its North American premiere in New York.

“I love doing it,” Huppert said of Sangsoo’s ultra-minimal productions, whose sets feature only a “tiny” camera, the director, his assistant and the actors. “It says so much about what it means to do a film. … It tells you how the cinema is flexible. It goes from the infinitely big – I was in Heaven’s Gate, for example – and it can be infinitely small.

Jakarta World Cinema (Jwc) 2024 concluded its vibrant 8-day celebration of global cinema today, marking a triumphant closing with the screening of Bird, the latest film by acclaimed British director Andrea Arnold.

From September 21st to 28th, the international film festival captivated no less than 11,100 attendees through its offline screening in Cgv Grand Indonesia theatre, and 31,400 viewers through online streaming on KlikFilm. With a total of 42,500 attendees, this year’s offline screenings nearly tripled the attendance from last year.

Jakarta World Cinema presented 120 films from 61 countries, screened across various genres and styles, representing voices from around the world. This year’s festival featured a diverse selection of renowned titles, including Jacques Audiard’s Emilia Perez, Jia Zhang-ke’s Caught by the Tides, Gints Zilbalodis’ Flow, Greg Kwedar’s Sing Sing, Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine As Light, Muhammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig, Hong Sang-soo’s A Traveler’s Needs,...

Acclaimed Korean filmmaker Yeon Sang-ho has set mystery thriller The Ugly as his next feature, which Plus M Entertainment will introduce to buyers at the Asian Contents & Film Market (Acfm) in Busan this week.

Yeon is known for directing Peninsula, which received a Cannes 2020 label and proved box office hit across Asia, taking $46.7m at the height of the pandemic; zombie thriller Train To Busan, which played at Cannes in 2016 and went on to take $140m at the global box office; and The King of Pigs, which became the first Korean animation to screen at Cannes when it was selected...

Indian-French coming-of-age drama Girls Will Be Girls was awarded best film in the First Feature Competition of Jakarta World Cinema in Indonesia, which launched a competition section for the first time this year.

Directed by Shuchi Talati, the film is set in a boarding school in the Himalayan foothills and follows the teenage protagonist through her first love and the interference of a protective mother. The film premiered at this year’s Sundance Film Festival where it won an audience award.

Best director in the First Feature Competition went to China’s Lin Jianjie for Brief History Of A Family, about a middle-class Chinese family in the post-one-child-policy era, who takes in their only son’s mysterious new friend.

Meanwhile, the Audience Award at Jakarta World Cinema went to Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance, starring Demi Moore, which won the best screenplay award at this year’s Cannes.

The three-year-old festival,...

Gone are the days when cinephiles could just expect “Cannes on the Hudson” from the New York Film Festival. In his fifth year since assuming leadership of the selection committee from Kent Jones, artistic director Dennis Lim continues to bring both vitality and variety to the festival. If there’s a near-constant among the changes, it’s Hong Sang-soo having two movies in the main slate. (This year it’s By the Stream and A Traveler’s Needs.)

Elder statesmen like David Cronenberg, Mike Leigh, and Paul Schrader return with their latest films. But this 62nd edition of the festival, which runs from September 27 to October 24, doesn’t belong to the veterans. If any streak runs through the main slate, it’s the prominence of second features, including RaMell Ross’s Nickel Boys (this year’s opening-night selection), Dea Kulumbegashvili’s April, and Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine as Light.

Isabelle Huppert, Hong Sang-soo favourite stars in New York Film Festival highlight A Traveler’s Need Photo: Anne Katrin Titze

Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist (co-written with Mona Fastvold and Silver Lion Best Director winner at the Venice International Film Festival), starring Adrien Brody with Felicity Jones, Guy Pearce, Stacy Martin, Joe Alwyn, Raffey Cassidy, Emma Laird, Isaach De Bankolé, and Alessandro Nivola; Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed Of The Sacred Fig with Soheila Golestani, Mahsa Rostami, Setareh Maleki, Niousha Akhshi, and Missagh Zareh; Dea Kulumbegashvili’s April (Special Jury Prize in Venice) with Ia Sukhitashvili, plus Hong Sang-soo’s By The Stream, starring Kwon Haehyo, Kim Minhee, and Cho Yunhee and his A Traveler’s Needs (winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the Berlin Film Festival) starring Isabelle Huppert, round out the five early bird highlights in the Main Slate program...

by Cláudio Alves

There's an odd comfort in seeking the new Hong Sang-soo film at any given festival. Thanks to the speed at which the Korean auteur runs through production, you'll usually find one. He regularly premieres multiple features every year. Earlier in 2024, he won the Silver Bear at Berlin with A Traveler's Needs. A few months later, he was at Locarno, ready to present his overall 32nd feature-length project, By the Stream, which took the Best Performance award for Kim Min-hee's work. This second project also made it to TIFF, delighting loyal fans with a new Hong that's much like all the other Hongs that came before. That's not a dig, merely a recognition of the director's remarkable consistency…...

Hong Sang-soo’s films have tricky narrative juxtapositions and symbols that often render potentially mundane moments transcendent. In Our Day, for instance, is composed of a handful of talky plot strands that are subtly connected by props and recurring references in the dialogue. Turn away at a pivotal juncture and you risk failing to grasp the film’s anatomy, as its essence resides in how carefully and fleetingly those and other strands coalesce.

In A Traveler’s Needs, though, Hong’s sleight of hand with narrative is less consistent than usual. For a long stretch of the film’s running time, Hong appears to have built the wrong concept around the wrong actor, giving Isabelle Huppert a conceptual role that leans hard on her brand of curt whimsicality. Kim Min-hee, a veteran of similar roles in Hong’s films, as well as his partner and a key collaborator behind the scenes,...

From buzzy world premieres to awards hopefuls making a stop on the way to Oscar gold, the Toronto International Film Festival is one of the biggest film events of the fall. We at FandomWire attended this year’s TIFF, where we saw 43 feature films. While narrowing this crop down to our ten favorites was a difficult task, we eventually narrowed it down to a batch of films we won’t soon forget.

After we share our top 10 films of TIFF with you, we will also share our thoughts on some of the other films we saw at the festival, so be sure to keep reading!

FandomWire’s Top 10 Films of the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival 10. The Room Next Door Image Courtesy of TIFF.

Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar has become one of the most beloved auteurs in international cinema with his unique brand of delicious melodramas. His latest film, The Room Next Door,...

El Festival se celebra del 20 al 28 de septiembre. © Ssiff

La 72ª edición del Festival de Cine de San Sebastián contará con una notable presencia de cineastas, actores, guionistas y productoras de renombre que se darán cita en la ciudad.

La Sección Oficial será el epicentro de muchas de estas figuras, quienes presentarán sus últimas producciones y participarán en diversas actividades del festival. La inauguración del festival estará marcada por la película Emmanuelle, que llegará acompañada de la directora Audrey Diwan y los actores Noémie Merlant, Will Sharpe, Jamie Campbell Bower y Chacha Huang. Por otro lado, para clausurar el festival, el director John Crowley y el actor Andrew Garfield presentarán We Live In Time (Vivir el momento), una de las películas más anticipadas de esta edición.

El Festival de San Sebastián también recibirá a destacadas personalidades como la directora Gia Coppola y la icónica Pamela Anderson, quienes asistirán a la proyección de The Last Showgirl.

The 68th BFI London Film Festival has just announced the line-up and – as always – a wide variety of Asian films is included in the vast Programme. Over 12 days, the Lff will showcase 255 works from 80 countries, featuring 64 languages and including 112 projects made by female and non-binary filmmakers.

The London Film Festival, officially called the BFI London Film Festival is organised annually by the British Film Institute (BFI) since 1953. It is the UK’s largest public Festival of its kind and is visited by thousands of film enthusiasts who have the the ability to see films, documentaries and shorts from all over the world. The festival will take place at London’s BFI Southbank and The Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall, as well as cinemas and venues across central London, and will run from 9 to 20 October 2024.

All the info about tickets and booking are Here.

And now, let’s browse the...

The death of the author is the birth of the reader, as we know from post-structuralist thought; then again, there are Hong Sangsoo’s public remarks. A charming video I often revisit shows the South Korean filmmaker outlining his working method: script dialogue completed the day of (also common on big Hollywood productions), followed by a light-speed editing assembly. But at a public Q&a in Locarno following the premiere of his latest, By the Stream, he revealed a shift; a day now separates his writing and location-shooting. Turning over his new film and this year’s other premiere, A Traveler’s Needs, the extra hours of composition and finessing are evident.

So how about Spot the Difference––which we cynically might call being on Hong world-premiere-reviewing duty. Yet By the Stream’s departures, and relatedly its virtues, are a bit more pronounced. Its running time almost grazes two hours––more...

Right Sketch, Wrong Skit: Sangsoo Scans Patterns in Bittersweet Interludes

Perspectives of regret and the uncertain odyssey of retrospection emphasize the undertones of perennial auteur Hong Sangsoo’s latest, By the Stream (his second premiere of the year following A Traveler’s Needs). While its title is reminiscent of any number of Sangsoo narratives, which tend to be tied to various forms of landscape, like beaches, hills, rivers, or mountains, his latest is a more melancholic, reflective departure, and (at least for Sangsoo) contains more pointed cultural critiques in the subtext than per usual. While there’s plenty of eating, drinking (and the guilty pleasure of smoking cigarettes), an assortment of patterns emerge in the eddies of its straightforward story.…...

Una selección que incluye de lo mejor de los grandes festivales internacionales. © Elástica Films / Universal Pictures / Ssiff

El Festival de Cine de San Sebastián ha anunciado los títulos que forman parte de la sección Perlak de esta 72 edición. Esta sección se compone de películas que han pasado por los grandes festivales de cine internacionales como la Berlinale, Cannes, Venecia o Toronto, y optan al Premio del Público Ciudad de Donostia / San Sebastián, que incluye dos galardones para los distribuidores del filme en España: uno a la mejor película (50.000 €) y otro al mejor filme europeo (20.000 €).

Desde la Berlinale, llega Yeohaengjaui pilyo (A Traveler’s Needs), de Hong Sangsoo, una cinta que obtuvo el Oso de Plata-Gran Premio del Jurado. Protagonizada por Isabelle Huppert, la película sigue la historia de una mujer francesa que se instala en Corea.

De Cannes aterrizan las películas más premiadas de su última edición: la ganadora de la Palma de Oro,...

“By the Stream,” the 32nd feature by Hong Sangsoo, opens as many of the previous 31 have, with a polite meeting between two softly acquainted people — neither strangers nor as familiar to each other as they might once have been. Tentative pleasantries are exchanged, before one says to the other, “You haven’t changed at all.” It’s a premature observation, of course: The ensuing action, such as it is, shows either how much has changed between the two, or how much they’ve forgotten along the way. Distinguished from other Hongs like it by its light autumnal chill and accompanying russet palette, this subtle comedy of actors, academics and dreams set to one side welcomes the director’s steadfast fans like a gentle but hesitant embrace.

Premiering in competition at the Locarno Film Festival, the prolific South Korean’s second feature of 2024 — following the Isabelle Huppert-starring Berlinale prizewinner “A Traveler’s Needs...

The San Sebastian film festival has cherry-picked the best of Cannes’ competition lineup for its Perlak section this year.

Virtually every film that scooped up an award in Cannes, from Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine as Light (grand prize), Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed of the Sacred Fig (special jury prize) and Coralie Fargeat’s The Substance (best screenplay) to Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or winner Anora, will screen in the Spanish festival’s sidebar, and compete for San Sebastian’s audience awards.

Jacques Audiard’s transgender crime musical Emilia Pérez, which won Cannes’ jury prize and the best actress honors for its ensemble cast, will open the Perlak section on Sept. 20.

Other Cannes titles, including Andrea Arnold’s Bird, Paul Schrader’s Oh, Canada, Parthenope from Italian director Paolo Sorrentino, and Francis Ford Coppola’s divisive opus Megalopolis, will also screen in the Perlak section. As will...

The 2024 New York Film Festival has revealed its main slate lineup including Cannes winners Anora and Seed of the Sacred Fig as well as the U.S. premieres of Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths, David Cronenberg’s The Shrouds and Roberto Minervini’s The Damned, which was also awarded at Cannes.

Indeed, the NYFF main slate features a number of Cannes prize winners in addition to Sean Baker’s Anora, which won Cannes’ Palme d’Or; exiled Iranian director Mohammad Rasoulof’s Seed of the Sacred Fig, which was awarded a special prize; and The Damned, which won best director in the Un Certain Regard section, shared with Rungano Nyoni’s On Becoming a Guinea Fowl, which will also screen at NYFF. Other Cannes faves set to play in New York include Payal Kapadia’s All We Imagine as Light, which won the grand prize at the French festival, and Miguel Gomes’ Grand Tour,...

New York Film Festival (NYFF) has announced a varied Main Slate featuring anticipated Venice world premiere The Brutalist from Brady Corbet as well as a raft of Cannes and Berlin winners including Sean Baker’s Cannes Palme d’Or winner Anora.

The line-up of 33 films announced on Tuesday morning includes Payal Kapadia’s Cannes grand prize winner All We Imagine As Light, Miguel Gomes’s best director winner Grand Tour, and Mohammad Rasoulof’s The Seed Of The Sacred Fig, recipient of the special prize.

Mati Diop’s Berlin Golden Bear winner Dahomey takes its place in the selection, as...

Thirty-three films will make up the Main Slate of the 62nd New York Film Festival, including the latest from David Cronenberg, Sean Baker, Payal Kapadia, Mike Leigh, Mati Diop, Hong Sang-soo and Julia Loktev. The festival will take place Sept. 27 — Oct. 14, 2024.

“The festival’s ambition is to reflect the state of cinema in a given year, which often means also reflecting the state of the world,” the festival’s artistic director Dennis Lim said in a statement. “The most notable thing about the films in the Main Slate — and in the other sections that we will announce in the coming weeks— is the degree to which they emphasize cinema’s relationship to reality. They are reminders that, in the hands of its most vital practitioners, film has the capacity to reckon with, intervene in, and reimagine the world.”

The movies in this year’s Main Slate come from 24 different countries.

New York Film Festival has revealed the Main Slate titles for its 62nd edition, which runs September 27 through October 14. The selection includes feature films from 24 countries, with 18 directors making their NYFF Main Slate debut, and two world, five North American, and 16 U.S. premieres. As previously announced, the festival will open with RaMell Ross’ “Nickel Boys” and close with Steve McQueen’s “Blitz” and will feature Pedro Almodóvar’s “The Room Next Door” as its Centerpiece.

The Main Slate includes celebrated films from festivals worldwide including Cannes prize winners: Payal Kapadia’s “All We Imagine as Light” (Grand Prize), Sean Baker’s “Anora” (Palme d’Or), Roberto Minervini’s “The Damned”, Miguel Gomes’s “Grand Tour” (Best Director), Rungano Nyoni’s “On Becoming a Guinea Fowl”, and Mohammad Rasoulof’s “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” (Special Prize). At this year’s Berlinale, Mati Diop’s “Dahomey” received the Golden...

“By the Stream” (aka “Suyoocheon”), the latest work by prolific South Korean minimalist director Hong Sang-soo, is set to release in North American theaters next year.

Rights were acquired by Brooklyn-based distributor Cinema Guild from sales agent, Seoul, Korea-based Finecut. Both companies have handled many of the director’s previous works.

The picture will have its world premiere in competition this month at the Locarno Film Festival. It will subsequently play at the New York Film Festival and other festival berths are expected to be announced in the coming weeks.

Hong is known for his micro-budget, minimalist drama films that are long on conversation, chance encounters and female protagonists. He also likes to work with a tight-knit circle of actors.

The new film is Hong’s 32nd as director. It takes him back to the campus setting of films like “Oki’s Movie” from 2010 and “Our Sunhi” from 2013. A press...

Cinema Guild has secured U.S. distribution rights for “Matt and Mara,” directed by Kazik Radwanski and starring Deragh Campbell and Matt Johnson.

The film debuted in the Encounters section at the Berlin International Film Festival earlier this year and closed the Jeonju International Film Festival in May.

The narrative follows Mara (Campbell), a creative writing professor, whose life takes an unexpected turn when she reconnects with Matt (Johnson), an author from her past. As their relationship develops, Mara navigates the complexities of her strained marriage to an experimental musician. When her husband unexpectedly cancels plans to drive Mara to a conference out of town, Matt accompanies her instead and the pressure in their undefined relationship slowly builds.

Campbell and Johnson reunite for the film after their roles in Radwanski’s “Anne at 13,000 ft.”

The deal was brokered by Cinema Guild president Peter Kelly and the film’s producers, Medium Density Fibreboard Films.

The Melbourne International Film Festival has set ten features to play in its Bright Horizons competition section.

They include: India Donaldson’s “Good One”; Luna Carmoon’s “Hoard”; Annie Baker’s “Janet Planet”; Leonardo Van Dijl’s “Julie Keeps Quiet”; Ena Sendijarević’s “Sweet Dreams”; Matthew Rankin’s “Universal Language”; Mo Harawe’s “The Village Next to Paradise”; Gints Zabalodis’ animated “Flow”; Rungano Nyoni’s “On Becoming a Guinea Fowl”; and Australian director Charles Williams’ debut feature “Inside.”

The non-competitive Headliners section, which showcases films that have premiered at other festivals, includes: Francis Ford Coppola’s “Megalopolis”; Mumbai-based director Payal Kapadia was recently the first Indian director for 30 years with a film in competition in Cannes presents “All We Imagine as Light”; Coralie Fargeat’s Demi Moore-starring “The Substance”; Jia Zhangke’s “Caught by the Tides”; Sebastian Stan in Aaron Schimberg’s “A Different Man”; Cannes best director-winning Asian odyssey,...

The Locarno Film Festival (August 7-17) has revealed the line-up for its 77th edition, with directors including Hong Sangsoo, Wang Bing and Ben Rivers world premiering their latest films in its international competition.

Playing out of competition at Locarno are world premieres from directors including Radu Jude, Fabrice du Welz, Aislinn Clarke, Bertrand Mandico, and Marco Tullio Giordana. Locarno’s famed Piazza Grande screenings include world premieres from Paz Vega, César Díaz and Gianluca Jodice.

Locarno’s international competition comprises 17 films, all of them world premieres, which will vie for the coveted Golden Leopard awards.

Scroll down for full line-up...