Dear audiences, welcome to Busan!
I am truly delighted to share with you once again a rich and captivating selection of new films from Europe. |
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※ Click on each still and discover more! |
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Gala Presentations with France's Leading Actresses |
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A Girl's Story - Judith GODRÈCHE |
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Godrèche's directorial debut feature, Toutes les filles pleurent (2010), is
an autobiographical comedy drawing on the struggles she faced as an actress.
She went on to become a symbolic voice of France's #MeToo movement, and in 2024 expanded
her personal disclosure into a collective one with the short film Moi aussi, made together
with some 1,000 survivors who had shared their testimonies with her.
Her new film, A Girl's Story, is based on the autobiographical novel of the same name by Nobel laureate
Annie Ernaux, sensitively reconstructing the memories of love and violence experienced by
an eighteen-year-old girl at a summer camp in 1958. The lead role of Annie is played by
the director's own daughter, Tess Barthélémy, making the film all the more meaningful as a work
completed together by mother and daughter. Having drawn attention as an official selection
in Un Certain Regard at this year's Cannes Film Festival, the film's director Judith Godrèche
and actress Tess Barthélémy will travel to Busan to meet audiences in person. |
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All About Corinne - Marc FITOUSSI |
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Marking the fourth collaboration between director Marc Fitoussi of Call My Agent! (2015-2020) and Isabelle Huppert, this film offers a warm and witty portrait of Corinne, an unknown background actor who dreams of her own spotlight as she forges a friendship with star actress Sandrine Kiberlain. Offering a sharp, affectionate look behind the scenes of French cinema, the film closed this year's Piazza Grande at the Locarno Film Festival. Director Marc Fitoussi and actress Isabelle Huppert will travel to Busan together to meet audiences for a special occasion. |
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Face to Face with European Masters : Bertrand Mandico, Marco Bechis…
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©2026 - ATELIER DE PRODUCTION - REDIBIS FILM - DUGONG FILMS -
ARTE France Cinéma - PROVENCE STUDIOS - MY UNITY PRODUCTION - KINOLOGY |
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Roma Elastica - Bertrand MANDICO
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A true master of imagination, director Bertrand Mandico rose to prominence with
his feature debut The Wild Boys (2017), named Best Film of the Year by Cahiers du Cinéma,
and has since earned devoted acclaim for his singular cinematic vision.
His new film Roma Elastica, set against the backdrop of Cinecittà, is a tribute to
the golden age of Italian cinema, starring Marion Cotillard, Ornella Muti, and Franco Nero.
Audiences can meet the director in person and attend a special masterclass. |
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Director Marco Bechis, himself a survivor once detained in a concentration camp
during Argentina's military dictatorship, drew on that experience to make Garage Olimpo (1999),
which screened at Cannes and established him as a filmmaker who has continued to
confront the scars of state violence. His new film Back to Buenos Aires, which premiered
in competition at Venice, returns once again to that era, confronting a survivor's guilt
in a work that stands as the director's own confession.
Don't miss the chance to meet both directors in person. |
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Under the Autumn Sky: European Cinema at Rooftop Theater
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Warmth, laughter, and a chill down your spine.
Spend an unforgettable autumn night at Rooftop Theater with these three European films. |
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©2026 ADNP - TEN CINEMA - GAUMONT - TF1 FILMS PRODUCTION - QUAD+TEN
Just an Illusion
Éric TOLEDANO and Olivier NAKACHE
Directors Toledano and Nakache, the duo behind
The Intouchables (2011), summon their own thirteen-year-old selves in this comedy. A time capsule of laughter and tears set in the Paris suburbs of 1985, where first love, a bar mitzvah, and the anxiety of unemployment collide — a film armed with humor and heart to rival Reply 1988 (2015).
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©Andrea Miconi
The Spiral
Paolo STRIPPOLI
A mother strikes a bargain with a mysterious stranger to save her daughter's life, and actor Valeria Bruni Tedeschi transforms into a demonic presence.
A class satire reminiscent of Parasite (2019) coils
together with hypnotic visuals into an elegant
nightmare of fear and desire, straight from Venice.
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©AvenueB - Jerome Prebois
All About Corinne - Marc FITOUSSI |
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A living legend with over 100 films to her name, Isabelle Huppert playing an unknown background actor is,
in itself, the film's most delicious joke. A warm, witty look behind the curtain of French cinema — a welcome invitation sent this autumn by one of its greatest stars. |
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Names the World's Festivals Discovered First
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Already celebrated at the world's leading festivals,
a cohort of Europe's next great auteurs is coming to Busan.
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©Anna Camerlingo
The Fire Within You
Edoardo DE ANGELIS
Naples-born Edoardo De Angelis made his
Venice debut with Indivisible (2016) and has since risen to become one of Italian cinema's defining voices, through The Vice of Hope and the war epic
Comandante (2023, Venice's opening film).
His new film, invited into this year's Venice
competition, is an autobiographical comedy of
a chaotic Christmas Eve, as a son settled
in Milan is descended upon by his hot-tempered
mother from Naples.
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©Nordisk Film Production A/S
May EL-TOUKHY
Danish-Egyptian director May el-Toukhy
won her international acclaim with the
Sundance Audience Award winner
Queen of Hearts (2019), later remade
in France by Catherine Breillat as
Last Summer (2023). The sole female-directed
title in this year's Venice competition,
her new film looks unflinchingly at
the violence inflicted on women's bodies
in the name of "liberation."
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Deep Blue
Ernesto Maria CENSORI
A striking feature debut from director Ernesto Maria Censori. Set in an off-season seaside hotel where elderly men from the Calabrian mafia and a boy searching for his father cross paths, the film contemplates the brutal legacy of violence passed down across generations. A work that announces the arrival of a formidable new talent in Italian cinema.
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©2025 Bobbypills Umedia
Marco NGUYEN and Nicolas ATHANÉ
The feature debut of Marco Nguyen,
former assistant director on The Rabbi's Cat (2011),
and Nicolas Athané. This adult animated film,
which sent the Lumière theater into a frenzy at this year's Cannes Midnight Screenings, delivers
a scathing satire of the hypocrisies within
the queer community itself, through a fictional virus
that turns gay men straight.
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Oasis
Jannis LENZ
Director Jannis Lenz, mentored by Jessica Hausner
and once an assistant director to Michael Haneke,
is a striking new voice. In a debut feature
reminiscent of Benny's Video (1992), he coolly
observes the precarious healing rituals of
three children who flee into the forest after being consumed by online violence.
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The debut feature of director Margherita Ferrari,
the first woman filmmaker chosen by Numero 10,
the company Paolo Sorrentino founded to
discover new talent. Set against the 2001 G8 protests
in Genoa, the film unfolds over one turbulent night
when protesters burst into the private world of an eighteen-year-old, eight months pregnant.
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©Kidam & Michigan Films
A Man of His Time
Emmanuel MARRE
Director Emmanuel Marre won the Gan Foundation Award at Cannes' Critics' Week for his debut,
Zero Fucks Given (2021), and claimed this year's
Cannes Best Screenplay prize for his new film.
Drawing on the life of his own great-grandfather, he offers a cold, precise portrait of an ordinary man rationalizing his own collaboration with the Vichy regime.
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A Day in the Life of Jo: Chapter Phaedra
Jacqueline LENTZOU
Greek director Jacqueline Lentzou
first drew notice with her debut,
Moon, 66 Questions (2021, Berlinale).
Inspired by the real death of a teenage boy
in Athens in 2008, her new film tenderly
holds the final day in the life of a fifteen-year-old girl, at once mysterious and warm.
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Titanic Ocean
Konstantina KOTZAMANI
The feature debut of director Konstantina Kotzamani, following a string of award-winning shorts.
Set at a Japanese academy that trains girls
to become professional mermaids, the film renders
its heroines' bodies, desires, and self-discovery
in dreamlike, hypnotic form.
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What Belongs to Others
Grzegorz DĘBOWSKI
Director Grzegorz Dębowski honed his cinematic instincts as an assistant director on Paweł Pawlikowski's Ida (2013). His social thriller follows a female burglar who assumes the identity of a dead tenant's lover, painting a pale, aching portrait of the lonely souls adrift in Warsaw.
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Eklipse
Manuel WETSCHER
A semi-autobiographical feature debut
from Austrian director Manuel Wetscher.
Drawing on his own experience of losing his father
to AIDS, the film quietly observes the ignorance
and prejudice that fracture two boys' friendship
over an Alpine summer in 1999.
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From Dawn to Dawn
Xisi Sofia YE CHEN
The feature debut of Spanish-born, Chinese-descended director Xisi Sofia Ye Chen, winner of the Grand Prize
at Switzerland's Visions du Réel. A documentary
in which the director herself, camera in hand,
quietly bears witness to the life of her older brother — the boy who once watched Hong Kong gangster films with her, and grew up to become one.
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Dear audiences of Busan, dear directors, dear actors —
I eagerly await the day we meet in Busan.
Warmly,
Programmer Seo |
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The 31st Busan International Film Festival Ticket Reservation
September 11 (Fri), 17:00 KST
Screening Schedule Announcement
September 17 (Thu), 14:00 KST
Opening/Closing Ceremony / Open Cinema (Outdoor Screenings) /
Midnight Passion (Late-Night Screenings) / Actors’ House / Community BIFF
September 21 (Mon), 14:00 KST
General Screenings / Master Class / Cine Class |
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3rd Floor, BIFF HILL, Busan Cinema Center, 120,
Suyeonggangbyeon-daero, Haeundae-gu, Busan 48058, Korea
TEL. 1688-3010 | FAX. 051-709-2299
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