BFI Flare launched yesterday with a humdinger of an opening movie: Andrew Ahn’s reimagining of Ang Lee’s 1993 The Wedding Banquet. Ahn’s partner in creating this update, James Schamus, also co-wrote Ang Lee’s version. While the original film features a single gay couple and a marriage of convenience, the reboot has two gay couples, which … [Read More]
Venue: BFI Southbank
Belvedere Road | South Bank | London SE1 8XT
| Web and contact link(s): |      |
Power and Paradox: Bong Joon-ho season at BFI Southbank
This retrospective of Bong Joon Ho, spanning an award-winning early short through to a series of internationally acclaimed features, charts the ascendancy of Korea’s most successful filmmaker, writes programmer Eunji Lee Korean cinema can be divided into two eras: before and after the emergence of director Bong Joon Ho. The advent of the 21st century … [Read More]
Korean films at BFI Flare 2025
This year at BFI Flare we have three films by Korean directors and one by a Korean American. The latter – The Wedding Banquet by director Andrew Ahn – has been chosen to open the festival and includes Oscar-winner Youn Yuh-jung among the cast. Londoners were introduced to Andrew Ahn’s work at Queer East last … [Read More]
Squid Game Season 2: preview screening
Three years after the huge global success of Squid Game we are delighted to unveil the first episode of the second series following a screening of Series 1’s gripping finale ‘One Lucky Day’. Player 456 remains determined to find the people behind the game and put an end to their vicious sport. Using this fortune … [Read More]
BFI Film Season: Echoes in Time — Korean Films of the Golden Age and New Cinema
The BFI Southbank programme for late October and November 2024 begins with Echoes in Time: Korean Films of the Golden Age and New Cinema, a major new season running from 28 October to 31 December. Programmed by Young Jin Eric Choi and Goran Topalovic, Echoes in Time will focus on two groundbreaking periods in the … [Read More]
Next Sohee (다음 소희) – preview & theatrical release
Highschooler Sohee is required to complete an internship before she can graduate. She is placed in a local call centre with a stressful metric-driven environment so toxic it drives one of her colleagues to suicide. July Jung’s compelling drama exposes the harrowing impacts of capitalism, particularly on the young and disadvantaged. Content warning: Contains scenes … [Read More]
Korean films at BFI Flare 2024
Last year BFI Flare had a Korean focus, giving us four feature films and a short. It’s only natural that this year’s offering won’t quite match up to last year’s feast, but still we have one feature and a short: Heavy Snow (폭설) Dir: Yun Su-ik (2023, 77 mins) Cast: Han So-hee, Han Hae-in Monday … [Read More]
Jung Jae-il in Conversation
Award-winning composer Jung Jae-il is has created some of South Korea’s most popular scores. He has worked on titles such as Kore-eda Hirokazu’s Broker, Hwang Dong-hyuk’s Squid Game series and collaborated with Bong Joon Ho on Okja and Parasite. At this event, he will talk about the growing appeal of Korea’s cultural output overseas and … [Read More]
Korean movies at BFI Flare
BFI Flare, London’s LGBTQIA+ film festival, this year has four Korean feature films plus one short. There is also a first-come, first-served discussion with some of the Korean film makers. Ticket links – and links to full details with movie synopsis on the BFI website – are below. Discussion: Spotlight on South Korea Saturday 18 … [Read More]
A Distant Place screens at BFI Flare
Jin-Woo lives a deliberately quiet life in rural Korea, working as a shepherd and looking after his young niece Seol. Though Seol is approaching school age, Jin-Woo keeps their contact with the outside world to a minimum, save for the family that employs him. But everything changes when his college boyfriend Hyeon-min and estranged sister … [Read More]
Snowpiercer screening w/ Bong Joon-ho + Tilda Swinton Q+A
Tickets go on sale today (for BFI members) for a rare screening of Snowpiercer. Non-members can buy from tomorrow. Snowpiercer Dir Bong Joon-ho (2013, 126min) With Tilda Swinton, Chris Evans, Song Kang Ho, Ed Harris, John Hurt + Q&A with director Bong Joon-ho and Tilda Swinton Sunday 1 March 2020, 7:20pm NFT Screen 1 | … [Read More]
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]
Lee Chang-dong’s Burning – Theatrical release
Lee Chang-dong’s Burning (2018) gets a UK theatrical release, from Thunderbird Releasing, in the run-up to the Oscars, for which it is shortlisted in the best foreign film category. In London it has a run at the BFI, among other venues, from 1 February. The evening screening on 5 February is followed by a Critics … [Read More]
Early Korean Cinema season at the BFI and KCC
Tickets for the Early Korean Cinema season at the BFI, which was announced as last year’s London korean Film festival came to an end, go on sale on 15 January. The organisers particularly direct our attention to two screenings: THU 7 FEB, 18:00 – OPENING SCREENING WITH LIVE PERFORMANCE + INTRO: Crossroads of Youth 청춘의 … [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]
Recording: Screen talk with Lee Chang-dong at BFI London Film Festival 2018
In case like me you couldn’t get tickets to the Screen Talk with Lee Chang-dong as part of the BFI London Film Festival, here’s the recording on the BFI YouTube channel. The interview took place on 20 October 2018, the day of an anti-Brexit demonstration in London – which is mentioned more than once in … [Read More]