London Korean Links

Covering things Korean in London and beyond since 2006

Brief review: Crossroads of Youth

Crossroads of Youth, Korea’s earliest surviving feature-length movie, was a great way to start the season of films from Korea’s colonial period. It is a season that could not have taken place 15 years ago, because these films have only recently come to light in the film archives of Beijing, Moscow and Tokyo. Crossroads of … [Read More]

BFI, KOFA and KCCUK announce archive exchange

Something to look forward to in February 2019: BFI, KOFA and KCCUK announce archive exchange to mark the centenary of the birth of Korean cinema More than ten of Korea’s oldest surviving films to screen to UK audiences for the first time in February 2019 at BFI Southbank and the KCCUK BFI restorations to show … [Read More]

Crossroads of Youth – a constantly-evolving performance of Korea’s earliest silent film

Crossroads of Youth is one of Korea’s earliest silent films, which would have at the time had narration by a byeonsa (the Korean equivalent of the Japanese benshi). The function of the byeonsa was to tell the story in the absence of diagetic dialogue (which in Western cinema was told through intertitles), in addition to … [Read More]