20,000 views and Counting!

The success of the Korean Cinema Blogathon cannot be understated! It has been the driving force over the last 2 years that saw the KOFFIA Blog, also known as Hungry for Drama, achieve the 20,000 views mark. A great initiative from the likes of Martin Cleary and Rufus de Rham, that we hope goes on for years! 

The Blogathon Effect!

More than 190 articles were written during the 2012 Korean Cinema Blogathon, as people from all around the world developed the discussion about Korean cinema. The more content that is written on or about Korean film can only help develop the industry, and its place in respected world cinema. 

We thank all of those bloggers that took part, and also all of you out there that consumed all the content! We specifically want to give a shout-out to the 13 KOFFIA contributers, who seemed to really raise the bar this year with their pieces which ended up totalling 30 individual posts! (quite possibly the most in the entire world from 1 source!) 

In case you missed any, we are going to list them all below, and we hope you all return again for the 2013 Korean Cinema Blogathon. Thanks again to CineAwesome! who did indeed do an awesome job with coordinating the week, and to the support sites such as New Korean Cinema, Modern Korean Cinema, Hangul Celluloid, V Cinema and Far East Films. 

It was great fun, and as always, LONG LIVE THE BLOGATHON!

• Paul Bramhall, HKFlix
1. Hammer & Touth: My 1st Encounter with Korean Cinema
2. Going International: Ninja Assassin & The Warrior's Way
3. Hollywood Bound: Korea's Trio of Talent Head West
4. Lights, Camera, Action! My Visit to Seoul Action School
5. Hwang Jang Lee: King of the Leg Fighters
6. In the Footsteps of the Stars: KOFIC Namyangju Studios
7. Kim Ji-woon: International or Korean, take your pick?
• Sarah Ward, Trespass Magazine
1. Song Kang-ho: An Adaptable Icon
2. Delving into the darkness: Park Chan Wook
3. Complex and Compelling: The Yellow Sea
• Richard Gray, The Reel Bits
1. Korean First: Sympathy for Mr Vengeance
2. Violence meets Violence: I Saw the Devil
3. Lee Young-ae: The Oxygen Woman
• Kieran Tully, KOFFIA
1. So you want to run a Korean Film Festival: The KOFFIA Story
2. Korean Film Downunder: Accessibility for Australian audiences
3. Busan Film Festival 2011: The Reviews
• Christopher Wheeler, Han Cinema
1. An Eye on Korean Cinema
2. Revenge, Korean style!
3. Poetry: Discover how film can truly be a beautiful creature
• Raelene Loong, Cinema on the Park
1. Redefining Storytelling and Kim Ki-duk's 3-Iron
2. JSA Joint Security Area: Discovering Korean Cinema
• James Brown, Madman Entertainment
1. Audacious & Refreshing: Discovering Korean Cinema
2. Time Out: An Appreciative Stroll Through Promenade
• Samson Kwok, Heroic Cinema
1. A Special Film: Bong Joon-ho's Mother
2. Original and Incredibly Fun: Discovering Korean Cinema
• Tim Milfull, Milfull.com
1. How Oldboy Changed the Way I View Asian Cinema
• Hugo Ozman, Twitch Film
1. The WON and only: Won Bin
• Hieu Chau, Musing with Hieu
1. Cinema with a Vengeance
• Joseph Sampson
1. 3 Korean Movies for all Seasons!
• Julian Buckeridge, At the Cinema
1. More than just the Action Kid!

Want to join the KOFFIA Blogging team? Have a favourite piece from the blogathon? Shoot us an email

Kim Ji-woon: International or Korean?...Take Your Pick

If anybody asks me who my favourite director is working in cinema today, I’m always able to answer without hesitation that it’s Kim Ji-woon. I first experienced his work with 2003s ‘A Tale of Two Sisters / 장화, 홍련’, and have been a fan ever since.  He’s the rare director that seems to be able to turn his hand to whichever genre he chooses, and create an excellent piece of cinema.

Kim Ji-woon...contemplating what to
put in each version of his next movie.

However despite my admiration, there is one frustrating element to Ji-woon’s work that started with 2005’s ‘A Bittersweet Life / 달콤한 인생’, and has been a recurring event with both of his movies released since then. It’s what I’ve come to call the curse of the International version & the Korean version. That is to say, all three of his most recent movies have come released in two versions, and each one has enough differences to warrant a separate viewing of each.  While seeing a different version of the same movie might hold novelty value for some, I for one personally wish that he would simply create his definitive vision of the movie, and release that for the world to see, not just a certain version for his local audience and a different one for the rest of the world. For me the most frustrating factor is when I try to switch my friends onto his work by showing them one of his movies, I often find myself scratching my head for far longer than any reasonable person should contemplating which version I should show.

To get mathematical for a second, let me provide the exact breakdown. For ‘A Bittersweet Life’, which to be fair had the two versions entitled the Theatrical cut & the Director’s cut, comparing them against each other the Director’s cut has 16 scenes removed, and 2 scenes rearranged & slightly lengthened which results in the Director's cut being 30 seconds longer. For ‘The Good The Bad The Weird / 좋은 놈, 나쁜 놈, 이상한 놈’, comparing the International version to the Korean version there are 30 alterations, including 7 scenes of alternative footage, 13 scenes in which the International version runs longer, & 1 recut. The difference in running time has the Korean version running 5:24 minutes longer.  Finally for ‘I Saw the Devil / 악마를 보았다’, comparing again there are 14 extended scenes in the International version totaling 3:20 minutes, 15 extended scenes in the Korean version totaling 5:37 minutes, and 3 alternative sequences.

Confused? It’s understandable. To give people some idea of what you’re in for and the reasons behind such decisions, not to mention the fact that unless you buy the Korean DVD release you might not even be aware of the different versions, I’ll take a look at each movie individually.

Busan Film Festival 2011: The Reviews

In October 2011, just upon the completion of running a festival in 2 states and working for 75 days in a row for about 15 hours a day, I decided to take a rest. By watching endless films in Busan!!! So no, it wasn't really a rest but it was a great experience and was the first time I have attended the Busan International Film Festival, so I thought I would recap my experience here on the blog.

I am going to be doing 2 entries to cover my experience, 1 in terms of reviewing the films I saw, and 1 of the experience of the festival and country itself. (The 2nd entry will likely be posted post-blogathon). If you are involved with Asian cinema or festivals it is highly recommended to attend, what has become the biggest film festival in Asia, sometime in your lifetime. Read on to see my thoughts on the films, guests and festival happenings! (apologies for my piss poor blackberry photos!)

The BIFF history lines the beach front

Discovering Korean Cinema: J.S.A. Joint Security Area

To continue on from my entry on how I discovered Korean cinema, I've decided to talk about another film that really changed the way I looked at Korean film and the different ideas in cinema. My previous entry highlighted my first Kim Ki-duk experience, and it was the beginning of what I am today.

I raved about 3-Iron (2004) and how much I loved it to Kieran not long after that. I had already, by then, heard about a few big names in the Korean film world. Bong Joon-ho, Kim something or rather, another Kim this and that, and then - Park Chan-wook. I heard much about Old Boy (2003) throughout film school, here and there in pockets throughout the interwebs and still did not rush to see it. It was kind of like the hype around Kill Bill (2003). It's awesome, It's epic, It's amazing. Or so I had heard. Kieran had a couple of Park's films in his gargantuam of a DVD collection, one of which was J.S.A.: Joing Security Area (2000), a film I had not heard about and had little interest to see at the time. The title alone was uninteresting - that and I had little concrete knowledge of the DMZ and the current situation between the North and South. I looked past all of this and decided to give it a go.

I'll be absolutely honest with you: I could not and did not get through the first 20 minutes of the film in my first viewing. It was all talk, no substance to me. I wasn't paying attention to the lengthy discussions between Lee Young-ae's character and Mr Tall Swiss man, who to me seemed like an excuse of a 'white' man in an Asian film. I fell asleep, and looked no further past the beginning. Kieran had told me what a great film it was, and I simply could not see it. And that was that.

The WON and only

To say that Won Bin is a popular actor in Korea would be an understatement; he is simply one of Korea’s hottest stars. Having acted in just a handful of films, he has already established himself as a professional and profitable actor, with two of his movies becoming the highest grossing films in Korea during the years they were released. 

Won Bin acted in a number of television series before he made the transition to the big screen. His most famous television drama was AUTUMN FAIRY TALE (aka AUTUMN IN MY HEART and ENDLESS LOVE), which was extremely popular across Asia. In 2001, he made the transition to the big screen with GUNS & TALKS, which topped the local box office charts for 3 consecutive weeks. 

In 2004, he appeared in Kang Je-gyu’s massive blockbuster TAEGUKGI (BROTHERHOOD OF WAR) in a role that earned him critical acclaim both locally and internationally. The film completed its theatrical run with 11.75 million admissions and became the top grossing film of all time in South Korea (a title it held until 2006 when THE HOST topped 13 million admissions and set a new record).