Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival 2002 A report from Russell Edwards
Part 1: Prologue International Customs officials around the world are notoriously unsociable to new arrivals. So when the customs officer in South Korea's Inchoen airport examined my passport there was nothing unusual in his inexpressive face. When he started to speak my pace began to race. "Do you know." It's a question. Oh my god, What have I done? Oh shit? "Do you know the movie Mad Max?" My face must have been the epitome of relief "Yesterday I watched one two and three."
An apt anecdote to coincide with my arrival in Puchon for The 6th Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival. Not as well known as Korea's renowned Pusan International Film Fest, this festival is the recipient of considerable international attention with correspondents from big time industry rags, Variety and Screen International on the scene. Small, intimate and friendly, this casual film fest allows the enthusiastic film goer to savour some of the latest in Korean cinema along side science fiction, thrillers and other odd films from around the globe. With all this major attention it is inevitable that the festival's reputation will grow. That said, in this satellite city of Seoul, it is like your average community centre got a sudden influx of millions of dollars and decided to have a film fest. The main centre for the festival was Boksagol Cultural Centre which housed a library and a swimming pool in addition to the auditorium used as a movie house. Under the watchful eye of this year's Festival Lady, Ha Ji Won (star of Ditto and The Phone the actress's image adorns nearly all the major festival venues in banner form) the faithful arrive mostly from Seoul and mostly female and mostly 25 and under. This cinematic equivalent to the Queen of Moomba was also to be heard before every screening with her phone etiquette reminder in Korean and English from the Korean Telecom Cultural Foundation. It sounded so silly especially when she pointed out that this would enable us to watch the movies "in a pleasant manner", but it has to be said that ringing phones was kept to a minimum, though the eerie glow of blue screens being consulted during the film were frequent.	PiFan www.pifan.com
	Ha Ji Won, Festival Lady
	Ha Ji Won in The Phone
The definition of fantastic is stretched from time to time. While primarily the films tend to science fiction, and horror, quite a few exceptions have been made, pushing towards thrillers and this year the underground cinema of New York. Opening night film, Bend It Like Beckham was claimed by the festival director Kim Hong-Joon as being appropriate for the festival because the success of Korea in the World Cup was so unexpected that it was like a fantasy for Korean people. Having cheered for the World Cup underdogs myself, I can't argue with that logic. While one could argue the point, the fact is that regardless of whether they accurately fulfil the brief, most of the films are of a very high standard. For film fests anywhere I operate on a general ratio of 1:4 for good versus bad and I am happy to report that I have sighted very few duds.

Next Section: Korean films at PiFan 2002

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© 2002 Russell Edwards

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