[BIFF Press Release] Busan International Film Festival (49)_(2019.10.06)

The Asian Project Market 2019 Opening Announced

The Asian Project Market (APM) 2019 presents 29 projects from Sunday, October 6 to Tuesday, October 8 at Exhibition Center 2, BEXCO, Busan.

APM, which marks its 22nd edition this year, is a business platform offering investment and co-production opportunities to promising new film projects from around the world by providing one-on-one meetings with the key players in the global film industry. Since its establishment in 1998, APM has presented 556 projects, and a total of 245 projects were realized into films. Ten recently completed APM projects are invited to the 24^th Busan International Film Festival. In particular, this year’s opening film, The Horse Thieves. Roads of Time co-directed by Yerlan Nurmukhambetov and Lisa Takeba, and the closing film, Moonlit Winter directed by Lim Dae-hyung, are both previous APM Projects.

This year’s number of meeting requests has surpassed last year’s figure by about 100 even before the APM began, demonstrating the ever-growing interest in the projects presented by APM.

Among this year’s APM projects, there are Silah and the Man with Two Names, the new project by director Yosep Anggi Noen whose latest film The Science of Fiction (Indonesia / APM 2014) was invited to the competition section of the Locarno Film Festival 2019; Skin of Youth by Ash Mayfair, whose feature debut, The Third Wife, premiered at Toronto International Film Festival and won the NETPAC Award; and Golden by the AFA (Asian Film Academy) alumnus director Jaime HABAC Jr. which deals with modern societal issues with a warm approach. In addition, the three projects from the Chines-speaking regions that are garnering much attention already with their treatment of today’s ongoing societal issues and the finest eight projects by Korean directors representing commercial to independent films of diverse genres provide a glimpse of the trend in today’s Asian cinema.

Festival and market badge holders can book meetings on site with the official APM projects at the APM zone. Sponsored by Busan Metropolitan City, MAS IMAGEWORKS, CJ ENM, LOTTE CULTUREWORKS, Korea Creative Content Agency, ARTE France, Norwegian South Film Fund, and MONEFF, the winners of APM awards will be announced at the APM Awards Ceremony that will be held at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, 8 October at the Grand Ballroom of Paradise Hotel Busan.

The 24th Busan International Film Festival will be held from October 3 to October 12, 2019

Asian Film Market 2019 will be held from October 5 to October 8, 2019

Asian Project Market 2019 will be held from October 6 to October 8, 2019