This autumn, the heart of Rome will be filled with excitement as JIB Dream Fanmeet returns with not one, but three spectacular Thai Boys’ Love (BL) events – between August 2025 and August 2026. Hosted at the Hilton Rome Airport Hotel in Fiumicino, these gatherings are not only about the stars, but also about the…
78th Locarno Film Festival: “Legend of the Happy Worker” Review
Duwayne Dunham is an artist of seemingly dual identities; both a long-term collaborator of David Lynch – directing several episodes of Twin Peaks, and editing every instalment of The Return – and a filmmaker responsible for several live-action Disney movies, both on the big screen and direct to the Disney Channel. Arriving at this year’s…
78th Locarno Film Festival: Roberto Rossellini’s “ANNO UNO” (Restored) Review
Roberto Rossellini was a key figure in Italian neorealism, known for films like Rome, Open City (1945), Paisan (1946), and Germany, Year Zero (1948). His use of non-professional actors and real locations transformed postwar cinema. Later, his collaborations with Ingrid Bergman – Stromboli (1950), Europe ’51 (1952), and Journey to Italy (1954) – showed how…
78th Locarno Film Festival: In Conversation with Park Syeyoung, Director of “The Fin”
Seoul-based Syeyoung Park is an interesting independent filmmaker. A graduate of the Korea National University of Arts, with a BFA in Film and an MFA in Video Arts, Park made his feature debut with The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra, which earned him awards at the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival, Seoul Independent Film Festival, and Fantasia,…
78th Locarno Film Festival: “The Fin” Review
Korean cinema continues to prove its global dominance not just through streaming platforms, but through visionary films that challenge and expand the very language of cinema. With The Fin, director Park Syeyoung delivers a haunting work, an unsettling look at control and survival in the aftermath of ideology. Set in a post-unification, ecologically devastated Korea,…
30th Busan International Film Festival: Special Program in Focus – Defining Moments of Asian Cinema
Marking its 30th milestone, the Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) presents the third edition of Asian Cinema 100 under the theme Defining Moments of Asian Cinema. Curated in collaboration with the Pusan National University Film Institute and the Korean Film Archive, the program revisits the artistry and history of Asian filmmaking through landmark works, each…
Park Chan-wook Returns with “No Other Choice”, Opening the 30th Busan International Film Festival
Three years after his critically acclaimed Decision to Leave (2022), director Park Chan-wook makes a powerful return to the screen with No Other Choice, a gripping drama centered on a man’s desperate fight to protect everything he holds dear. The story follows Man-su (Lee Byung Hun), a once-proud man whose stable life is suddenly upended…
“LARGO” Short Film Review
“There are 11 million child refugees in the world. 1.3 million in Europe. 127,000 in the UK.” And each one has a name. In LARGO, we meet just one: Musa, a young Syrian boy living in the UK, who, against all odds and all the impossible rules of the adult world, sets out to build…
Ali Sethi’s “Love Language”: A Flamboyant, Powerful Debut Album
With artistic freedom under increasing scrutiny, Pakistani-American singer/songwriter Ali Sethi breaks free with his latest project, Love Language. Across 16 tracks, Sethi creates a visceral pop world that flits beautifully across Urdu, Punjabi, Hindi, and English in a true celebration of cross-cultural musicality. Opening with the haunting notes of O Balama, with its dystopian mix…
Hopeful Youths: Boy Group ARrC On Their 3rd Mini-Album “HOPE”
Awesome is a flawless jump-split without whincing. Awesome is a neat blend of folk and swag. Awesome is a group of boys on a quest to infuse hope into the world. Young K-pop septet ARrC’s name stands for Always Remember The Real Connection, and it wasn’t just pulled out of thin air. The boys, whose…
VIEW OF THE ARTS 