“It took me sixteen years to make Seoul Searching and bring it onto the big screen,” Benson Lee admits in the interview for View of the Arts. Seoul Searching, based on the filmmaker’s personal experiences, is an endearing youth comedy which depicts foreign-born teenagers of Korean ancestry learning what it means to be Korean, and…
In Conversation with Teo Yoo
Teo Yoo, born and raised in Germany, left for New York City at the age of 20, to study acting at the prestigious Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, a school known for its notable alumni such as Christoph Waltz, Bridget Fonda and Uma Thurman. After New York, he travelled to London where he took on an intensive course…
Min Kyu Dong’s The Treacherous
I have honestly lost count of how many period films, set in the Joseon Dynasty, have been made in Korea. It seems like this particular kingdom, which was founded by Yi Seong-gye in 1392, has left a significant legacy for modern Korea; not only when it comes to societal norms, attitudes and language, but it…
The Wolfpack Review
What happens if a group of people is raised in a hermetic space, essentially locked away from the rest of the world but not from the world of film? The intense and fascinating documentary The Wolfpack (2015, Crystal Moselle) provides the answer to that very question by opening a window into a mid-sized apartment on…
The 59th London Film Festival: The Wave
Recent years have been relatively successful for Scandinavian Cinema and its filmmakers, who constantly show that they are able to deliver good quality films. For instance: ZoZo (Sweden, 2005) by Josef Fares, Let the Right One In (Sweden, 2008) directed by Tomas Alfredson, Dancer in the Dark by Lars Von Tier (Denmark, 2001), The Hunt (Denmark,…
Memories of the Sword Review
It has been two years since Lee Byung- hun showed his acting talents off in a Korean production. He was recently seen in American films such as Terminator Genisys, RED 2 and G.I. Joe Retaliation, and has two English speaking movies in the pipeline: Misconduct, alongside Al Pacino and Anthony Hopkins, and Magnificent Seven, a remake of…
Paolo Sorrentino’s Youth: A Simple Song
In the beautiful setting of an Alpine resort, time stops. Skips a beat. Rewinds. Fast forwards. It is a luxurious hotel, but it almost feels like a high-end retirement home. The guests, most of whom appear to be in their autumn years, move from having their daily spa time to their doctor’s appointments to their…
Lift-Off Film Festival Awards Show
Try to picture it: Pinewood Studios on a brisk Friday night, the champagne is flowing, and filmmakers, actors, and guests of honour are dressed in their finest. Guessed what the event is yet? No? It’s the Lift-Off Film Festival Awards Show. It’s not quite the Oscars, but it’s the largest independent film festival in the…
23rd Raindance Film Festival: 1 World 100 Lonely Review
Is online dating the last resort of meeting ‘the one’? Or is it just a place to meet people from around the world and make new friends in no time? 1 World 100 Lonely is the new feature film by Brian McGuire, an American filmmaker, whose work evolves around the aforementioned subject as well as four…
The 59th London Film Festival: In Conversation with Choi Dong-hoon, director of ‘Assassination’
Choi Dong-hoon, a South Korean director, began his voyage into filmmaking in 2004 when he released The Big Swing, a crime thriller, which brought him instantaneous praise from domestic and foreign critics. A couple of years later, Choi Dong-hoon repeated his previous success with another interesting production, Tazza: The High Rollers, an adaptation of Huh Young-man and…
In Conversation with Robert and Jamie MacDonald- Three Kilts in Mongolia
How many Scotsmen do you need to tackle a Mongolian wrestler? This is the question I tried to ask the airline pilot Jamie MacDonald, photographer Robert MacDonald and David Scott, who travelled to Gengkis Khan’s kingdom to challenge the locals to wrestling. They undertook a 5000 mile journey to experience not only the sport itself,…
The 10th London Korean Film Festival: We Will Be Ok Review
Would You Rather Die than Lead an Ordinary Life? It happens, every once upon a film festival moon. Those of you who have visited a film festival or two – especially if you were there as press – know what the usual rhythm is like. You dig and tread and boot and occasionally half-sleep your…
The 10th London Korean Film Festival: In Conversation with Zhang Lu
Zhang Lu, a Korean-Chinese filmmaker who was born and raised in China’s Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, has been living and working in Korea since 2012. Most of his films have focused on the disenfranchised ethnic Korean and Chinese-Korean people living in China; these include Grain in Ear (2006), Desert Dream (2007), Dooman River (2011), Scenery (2013), and…
The 10th London Korean Film Festival: Twenty
Lee Byeong-heon, a South Korean filmmaker, debuted with the feature Cheer Up Mr Lee in 2013, which subsequently came to win the Audience Award at Seoul International Film Festival. A couple of years later, he released his second movie entitled Twenty; a coming-of-age film which brought him wide recognition among the foreign as well as domestic audience….
VIEW OF THE ARTS 