The Returning Genre Film Festival BIFAN Closes... 90,000 Visitors

Series Film Award Established, Squid Game Wins

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Lee Isul] The Bucheon Fantastic Film Festival (BIFAN, Executive Chairman Shin Cheol), held as an in-person festival for the first time in three years, has concluded its eleven-day journey.

BIFAN opened on the 7th and closed its 26th edition with a closing ceremony at Bucheon Eoulmadang at 7 p.m. on the 17th. The closing film was director Jeong Beom-sik's "New Normal."

This year’s festival, held in a hybrid format both offline and online, showcased 268 films from 49 countries to audiences. Screenings took place at 13 venues including Bucheon City Hall Lawn Square, Eoulmadang, Fantastic Cube, Korea Manhwa Museum, CGV Sopung, and Megabox Bucheon Starfield City, as well as online on Wavve.

As of 8 a.m. on the 17th, the total number of attendees was 92,353, with 49,925 cinema viewers. Event participants numbered 42,428, including 32,148 offline attendees, 11,274 online viewers, and 6,503 XR participants, totaling 49,925 viewers. The "July Halloween" event attracted 31,110 attendees, the actor special exhibition and memoir exhibition had 3,660 visitors, and the Strange Stage drew 1,750, summing up to 42,428 participants.

This year, actor Seol Kyung-gu was featured as the protagonist of the special exhibition "Seol Kyung-gu is Seol Kyung-gu." Since 2017, the festival has selected a representative Korean actor for a special exhibition, following Jeon Do-yeon, Jung Woo-sung, and Kim Hye-soo, making Seol the fourth.

There were four master classes by directors such as Brian Yuzna and Masato Harada, four Megatalk sessions including the Seol Kyung-gu special exhibition, and ten casual talks titled Zootopia. In total, 123 events including audience talks (GV) and program events were held.

Domestic and international guests totaling 1,191 visited Bucheon, including Kim Rok-kyung, Kim Su-jeong, Moon Geun-young, Byun Sung-hyun, Bu Ji-young, Lee Kyung-mi, Lee Myung-se, Jang Gun-jae, Jeong Beom-sik, Jo Hyun-chul, Hong Seok-jae, Takashi Miike, Ryuichi Hiroki, Rob Jabbaz, Fajar Nugros, Cl?ment DeNœux, and actors Kim Bo-ra, Kim Seung-soo, Kim Ye-won, Seo Hyun-woo, Park Jae-chan, Seo Hyo-rim, Seol Kyung-gu, Yoon Kyun-sang, Oh Ji-ho, Jung Ryeo-won, Jung Dong-won, Oh Ji-ho, Han Sun-hwa, among others.

There were also confirmed COVID-19 cases. The BIFAN Executive Committee stated, "Sixteen overseas guests, staff, and volunteers tested positive for COVID-19 during the festival period but were promptly managed." They added, "Overseas guests were quarantined at Central 13 Center and other facilities with cooperation from Bucheon City Hall and Bucheon City Health Center to prevent further spread."

This year, BIFAN became the first international film festival to establish a "Series Film Award," which was awarded to "Squid Game." The Executive Committee explained, "Considering the era where spatial and temporal constraints have disappeared and the diverse fusion of culture and technology is taking place, Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival proposes and asserts that all forms of visual content based on storytelling should be broadly defined as films."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.