Doubled Audiences and Expansion to Online Screenings
The 9th London Korean Film Festival (festival director: JEON Hye-jung) had a successful run from November 6th (Thu) through to 21st (Fri). The festival took place at 7 theaters in 4 cities (London, Norwich, Hebden Bridge and Aberystwyth), with a total of 55 Korean films shown to the public. Especially for this edition, 4 actors (
AHN Sung-ki,
JUNG Woo-sung,
GANG Dong-won and LEE Jin-mu), 3 directors (
YOON Jong-bin,
PARK Chan-kyong and
July Jung) and 2 producers (
LEE Joon-dong and
J.D. HAN) came from Korea and 6 Asian film experts from London were invited as special guests to the festival. The guests received positive reactions from the audiences by participating in various events such as forums and conversations with the public to talk about Korean films. As a result, the number of visitors to the 9th London Korean Film Festival reached up to 10 thousand. This is nearly twice as big as the previous year.
In addition to the regular theater screenings, online screening platform MUBI.COM was utilized for pay per view services of classic Korean films while film focused channel Film 4 also broadcasted Korean films. These changes helped in expanding and advertising outside of the usual vicinity. With a stronger commercial film line-up and variety in programming that takes into consideration all age groups and tastes, can be considered as a reason for the success of increased attendance.
Lead actor GANG Dong-won and YOON Jong-bin (director) appeared for the screening of the opening film,
KUNDO : Age of the Rampant and AHN Sung-ki, a great Korean actor, showed up for the closing gala screening of
Revivre to catch the attention of the audience. JUNG Woo-sung excited local fans when he stepped on the red carpet to attend the ‘K-Focus: Actor Jung Woo-sung’.
Festival director JEON Hye-jung expressed her plans for the future saying, “Based on the achievements of the 9th London Korean Film Festival, I want it to act as the hub in Europe for showcases of Korean films and I will try to expand it to wider audience groups. I will continue to run programs for Korean films so that students in film schools in UK would actively study Korean films.”
INTERVIEW ===
JEON Hye Jeong, Festival Director of the 9th London Korean Film Festival
“ Want LKFF to Act as the Hub in Europe for Korean Films.”
The 9th London Korean Film Festival successfully ended. How was the result?
Before the festival started, Asian film experts were invited to a radio talk show specialized in films, Radio 4 run by BBC, to introduce programs of London Korean Film Festival. 5 films directed by
HONG Sang-soo were broadcast on TV (Film 4) in conjunction with the festival. It was done to expose Korean films to the British audiences and hopefully increase the admissions to the festival. As a result, the gross number of audiences doubled from last year. We also made a partnership with MUBI.COM, the largest online film service company in Europe, and provided Korean classic films online which resulted in expanding the space of the festival. ‘K-Focus: Actor JUNG Woo-sung’ was intensively covered for 6 minutes at BBC World News and JUNG Woo-sung actually had an interview at the studio during the festival. In addition, a rough sketch extensively covering the festival from the opening to the closing and interview footages of YOON Jong-bin and GANG Dong-won of were aired on BBC World as a special program at the end of November. It was not only impressive that the number of visitors increased but also unusual that local broadcasting stations were very much interested in our festival.
I heard the attendance rate of local audiences has been increasing every year. Please tell me how many local audiences came to the festival.
Thanks to actors in attendance including JUNG Woo-sung, GANG Dong-won and AHN Sung-ki, there were a lot of Koreans who visited us, but according to questionnaires, about 80% of the visitors were British. Documentary
MANSHIN: Ten Thousand Spirits, K-Focus: Director
Kim Ki-duk, general screenings and indie film section attracted more local fans than Koreans.
I also heard that there is a special event at the closing reception of the London Korean Film Festival.
Every year at the closing reception, we select from the pool of local reporters and invite some of them to the Busan International Film Festival. Supported by Asiana Airlines, we give them free flights so they could watch more Korean films and meet more people in the film industry. And in Korea, we also help them to enjoy the Festival. Then they write stories about the festival and Korean films on their media. This year, Neil Smith of BBC screamed and hugged his wife when he was chosen as the lucky one.
It is unusual that the festival takes place not only in London but widely in small towns, too.After 10 days of screening in London, we traveled around 3 local towns; Norwich, Hebden Bridge and Aberystwyth. Hebden Bridge is 4 hours away by car and 4,500 people live there. Memories at this town are the most special to me. It is the birthplace of the Brontes and it was the background of the British novel Wuthering Heights. There is only one theater at the small town. For an art-house that screens only once every night, the festival ended up drawing 1% of the total population during the festival. During the festival,
Poetry and
A Girl at My Door were most loved. It was very fruitful and meaningful to show Korean films to people of a small town where Korean culture is not known at all.
Which section received most favorable reactions from the local audiences during the festival?
The average age of attendees at the festival is relatively high. We run the K-POP Section every year to screen films for young people. This time, we screened The Youth starring Dong-hae of the Super Junior. We planned to smoothly connect the screening with a K-POP concert of Dong-hae and Eun-hyeok (another member of the Super Junior), which resulted in attracting K-POP fans not only in the UK but also widely from Europe. Tickets for 832 seats were all sold out early and there were even scalpers illegally selling tickets.
What kind of festival do you want it to be in the future?
I want it to act as the hub in Europe for showcases of Korean films. I also want to let Europeans know about the overall culture of Korea through Korean films. With the entertaining factor on my side for commercial films, I have been trying to expand the fan base for Korean movies in Europe. I am also planning to invest much effort in archiving so that Korean films would be actively studied and commonly shared in Europe. I would like to provide a platform where research and study of Korean directors is convenient in Europe through archival work. Besides, I hope to play an industrial role in the exchange of Korean actors and technical staff with foreign countries.