The Pusan International Film Festival (and Busan) In Pictures

This past October, I had the great opportunity to attend this year's Pusan International Film Festival, Korea's huge and sprawling film festival. It was a series of firsts for me: my first trip to Korea, my first international film festival coverage. Beyond my jet lag, general lack of sleep, and a few logistical problems, it was a tremendous, overwhelming, and exciting experience, one which I hope to repeat next year, hopefully for longer than the few days I was able to spend this year. I'm still working on some more pieces I hope to publish soon. In the meantime, over at my regular haunts at Meniscus Magazine, you can find my festival overview/travel guide, and reviews of two festival films: Roh Gyeong-tae's lovely film Land of Scarecrows (my favorite of the fest), and Claire Denis' exquisitely textured 35 Shots of Rum. As a supplement to this material, I thought I'd post here some pictures I took during the festival.

First, here's a view of Busan from my hostel window:

Haeundae Beach, Busan's main tourist attraction:

The entrance to the PIFF Pavilion, where festivalgoers can relax, have some coffee, do a little shopping, and enjoy a leisurely stroll along the beach between screenings:

More photos from the PIFF Pavilion:

Outside the SfunZ (Special Fun Zone) shopping mall in Haeundae, home of the Megabox Haeundae multiplex, one of the main PIFF venues:

Not too far from SfunZ and Haeundae Beach is the Haeundae Market, where besides shopping for clothes and other items, you can find some great fried seafood stalls and some great little restaurants:

The entrance to the Outdoor Theater, PIFF's open-air screening venue located at the Busan Yachting Center, following the screening of Shinobu Yaguchi's latest film Happy Flight:

Introducing Happy Flight were, from left to right, director Shinobu Yaguchi and actors Seiichi Tanabe and Haruka Ayase:

And finally, here's the Happy Flight trailer: