BIFF and Youku Team up for "Asia Collaboration Project"

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NEWS & REPORTS

BIFF and Youku Team up for "Asia Collaboration Project"

Jun 23, 2015

Writer by Sonia KIL
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Festival Aims to Nurture Young Talents from the Region

Following up on the memorandum of understanding signed last October in Busan, the Busan International Film Festival will begin a talent-development project entitled "Asia Collaboration Project" in collaboration with China's largest online video-streaming service Youku. The project aims to discover and nurture aspiring young Asian directors, according to the festival's statement released today (June 22).

From 2015 to 2017, the "Asia Collaboration Project" will give financial support to four new directors and four established directors to produce short films. BIFF selected new filmmakers LEE Han-jong from Korea, Asimta SHRISH from Nepal, and Phuttiphong ARRONPHENG from Thailand, while Youku recommended China's Cheng LIANG, for the inaugural edition. Two of the three selected newcomers—SHRISH and ARRONPHENG—are the festival's annual filmmaking workshop Asian Film Academy alumni.

In addition to the new filmmakers, established filmmakers who are to join this edition are: South Korea's IM Sang-soo (The Taste of Money), Japan's KAWASE Naomi (An), China's WANG Xiaoshuai (Red Amnesia) and Thai helmer Apichatpong WEERASETHAKUL (Cemetery of Splendor). The festival styled them as "master directors."

The eight completed shorts will premiere at the annual Busan International Film Festival in October. BIFF programmers and the four master directors will then select one finalist from the four shorts by the new directors, who will later be financed by Youku to make a feature.

The 20th edition of the Busan International Film Festival is scheduled to run from October 1-10 this year.

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