Films from PIFF

I think last year I posted a bit about the Pusan International Film Festival, so I thought I'd take a moment to write to you today about this year's offerings. I attended 13 movies this year (couldn't top my number from 2009). Some of the highlights were seeing a Korean actress who used to be very famous, an old Spanish film by director Carlos Saura, one international short film competition, a great South African film on the outdoor screen, and downloading some flicks I didn't get to see during the festival!

Kim Ji-mi (김지미)

Kim Ji-mi (Jimi Kim)
Born in 1940 in Daejeon, South Korea as Kim Myung-ja, this amazing woman acted in romance, drama, and even a few comedy movies from 1957 to 1992!! That's 35 years for all you math majors out there! I saw two of her films featured at PIFF this year. (I've read she starred in ~330 films and appeared in over 700 during her career!)
HanCinema's article on Kim Ji-mi at 2010 PIFF

Kim Ji-mi, circa 1975

The First Stone (couldn't find a website)

This was an interesting Iranian film about a man in a small village who decides to unconventionally buy a gravestone for himself. He goes into the city and spends a month's wages on an extravagant huge headstone which is then idolized by his fellow villagers, his children, and eventually his wife. Other families begin to follow suit and some even copy the inscription on the hero's original stone. This movie offers a very different view about life, death, and what's important while we're all here on this earth.

The Bang Bang Club

The Bang Bang Club

A great South Africa-Canadian project which tells the story of the true-life Bang bang photographers, young men who rush into intense conflict in civil-war-stricken S.A. to document the horrors. Starring Ryan Phillippe and Malin Akerman, it involves a little love story, a little politics, a good bit of action, and a lot of heart. Plus it's a beautifully shot film.

How I Ended This Summer
This one I had to download since I couldn't get a ticket. It came highly recommended, and in the end, I liked it. It's a Russian film set on a polar island with lots of technical stuff going on. Stick through this somewhat slow, quiet film to be rewarded with a great story about the relastionship between two isolated men who rely on each other in different ways. Not just another nearly homoerotic bromance~ this one gives a heartfelt perspective on dealing with loss and loneliness. Worth a watch.

Short Film Showcase 2
The best film from this lineup was a Philippine short called "P" which featured characters with P-names, lots of p-words, and those words' definitions containing many p-words. It was actually laugh-out-loud funny! Another from Taiwan, called A Mind of My Own, was about a young girl who has long been in a coma when her spirit leaves her body and meets with the other coma patients' spirits. It really wasn't as hokey as that sounds... really. I was even a little teary by the end. It was sweet.



Others I wanted to see, but couldn't get a ticket to:

All About Love, Raavan (aka Raavanan), Late Autumn (2010 remake), Rolling Home with a Bull, Kites, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps, Ordinary Days, and Kabuki-za: Final Curtain. Look them up :)

PIFF 2010 English website

At work

Oh, wow, where have the days gone?! I'm now at work, with about an hour to spare before I head home on a Thursday afternoon. I like Thursdays. I finish teaching at 12:10, eat lunch, then I'm free to prepare all the things I'll need for upcoming lessons. Today, I've been extra-specially productive. I made a worksheet for a song I'll teach next week, a PowerPoint for my game tomorrow, word cards for the next lesson in 4th grade, uploaded a TON of photos, texted a few friends, arranged my trip to Daegu this weekend, emailed my recruiter about a 6-month job, double-checked the post office's hours (so I can send my sissy a box), and written to you! All of this while watching the shows I miss from the US. I've been downloading a lot, like Glee, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice, Project Runway, Weeds (♥), Modern Family, Dexter, Arrested Development, Six Feet Under, Big Love, Mad Men... I've really gotten into a LOT of new shows lately! Comedy, drama, reality... fact is, it's all WAAAY better than what's on the tele here. I'm so tired of CSI.

The photos I uploaded were loooooong overdue, even longer than this message! I took over 300 photos at the World Firefighter Games in Daegu. After critique, I chopped it down to ~230. I know ~ it's a lot to take in, but it really was an amazing 3 days! If you take a little peek at my recent Korea set on Flickr, you can see the collection at a glance.



I'm so glad it's Thursday with half an hour to go, and I'm REALLY glad tomorrow's Friday with a great Daegu weekend ahead. This evening I'm off to the post office, the bank, then a university to volunteer for English group. Tomorrow evening I'll be at the beach in Busan for the Fireworks Festival, then north on the train late Saturday morning. Be back with you soon!