[HanCinema's Digest] Cinema Snippets

Crowd sourcing for Korean films grows in popularity, KoBiz has an exclusive interview with one of Korea's top VFX supervisors, The Hollywood Reporter looks at the country's current censorship crisis, and Sonia Kil looks ahead at some of the blockbusters expected to make 2017 another great year for Korean cinema.

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"A Little Makes a Lot: Korean Films with Successful Crowdfunding"

There have been a number of South Korean films have been produced thanks to a relatively modern method: crowd sourcing. Appealing to the public and private organizations to produce a film is, as Kim Hyung-jung points out in this post on KoBiz, no stranger to modern Korea's cinema industry; in 2016, for example, the producers of "Spirits' Homecoming" managed to raise over half a million US dollars. The number of crowd-sourced Korean films is becoming more prevalent as more films are finding the funds to create features that would otherwise never reach our screens.

...READ ON KOBIZ

"KWAK Tae-yong, the VFX Supervisor of TRAIN TO BUSAN and ASSASSINATION"

Kwak Tae-yong was the VFX supervisor behind Jeon Sang-ho's 2016 hit "Train to Busan" (11.5 million admissions) and Choi Dong-hoon's "Assassination" (12.7 million admissions). In this exclusive interview on KoBiz, Kim Hyung-seok puts a number of great questions to this technical talent, like how he got into film, his thoughts on genres, and what changes have occurred in the VFX space over the past decade. "Creating something to look realistic is a given. However, you also have to consider how the audience is going to accept what is being shown", says Kwak.

...READ ON KOBIZ

"Inside South Korea's Battle With a State-Sponsored Censorship Crisis"

The Hollywood Reporter delves into the recent scandal in South Korea where thousands of artists were blacklisted by the government, a controversial move which eventually led to the arrest of the country's Culture Minister, Cho Yoon-sun. As the article notes, "Revelations about the blacklist have infuriated the public", but the country is also no stranger to censorship issues on its big screens...

...READ ON THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

"Korea's Star Directors Are Poised for Their Big 2017 Releases"

Variety's Sonia Kil's looks ahead to some of the big films Korean cinephiles can expect to enjoy in 2017. Last year was a "banner year" for South Korean cinema, and it looks like 2017 will continue to turn up the heat with exciting films from some of the country's top directing talents and featuring many of the country's top stars. "2017 is likely to see another set of blockbusters from big names", writes Sonia. What films are you looking forward to this year? Let us know in the comment section below...

...READ ON VARIETY