Minervini, who achieved success with three documentaries, made a comeback with a drama and won the Best Director award in the Un Certain Regard section at the Cannes Film Festival. He has dug into the soil of American society through the eyes of the other, and in The Damned, he seeks fundamental reflection from the period of the Civil War. His approach to filming remains the same, making the movie appear as if it were a documentary shot in 1862. A scouting party sent to the frontier finds their faith tested in an unknown land. Believing that God is on their side, the scouts face an incredible irony, which rises from a situation where an invisible enemy is constantly imagined, and Minervini gets to the root of the question. The film, with only a 7-minute shooting sequence, is more like a re-examination of the Western genre than a war historical drama. The hero who led the cavalry and the community has vanished, leaving a few disoriented and exhausted soldiers wandering through the wilderness and snowfields. It is a thoughtful Western film that falsifies the western myth of white settlers. (LEE Yong Cheol)

MA – Cry of Silence is a story about Mi-Thet, an 18-year-old woman. She becomes the head of the household in Myanmar, a country that has gone through a humanitarian crisis following a coup d’état, experiencing the collapse of her community and family. As the military systematically destroys rural villages under the pretext of eliminating resistance forces, young people flock to the cities. Mi-Thet gets a job at a garment factory with others in similar circumstances and leads a life commuting between the dormitory and the factory. Enduring frequent blackouts and the constant sound of gunfire, she suffers from poor meals and demands for overdue rent but persistently continues to send money to her family. In this precarious existence, non-payment of wages becomes a significant crisis in her life. Her colleagues, who are fed up with sexual harassments and unpaid wages, go on strike, but Mi-Thet hesitates to join them. Thus, her youth, which should have been bright, becomes marked by darkness and bitterness. (PARK Sungho)

Eighteen-year-old Li Qi is confident and skilled in handling difficult customers at her mother’s fish shop in the local market. After refusing her mother’s suggestion to repeat a year after failing her college entrance exams, Li Qi accidentally breaks Xiaowei’s iPhone during a fight at Xiaowei’s birthday party. Thus begins her struggle to buy a new iPhone for Xiao Wei. The world is harsh and unforgiving to an 18-year-old who has not successfully transitioned from high school to college. As Li Qi stands at the boundary between adolescence and adulthood, her sense of hopelessness, anxiety, and pain is metaphorically represented by the pain of a fishbone stuck in her throat. With its intricately woven narrative and compelling conflicts between characters, the film won the New Talent Award for Best Screenplay at the Shanghai International Film Festival and Best Actress at the Xining FIRST International Film Festival. (PARK Sun Young)

Julie is a promising tennis player at a tennis academy. Just before the Belgian Tennis Federation (BTF) scout test, an unfortunate incident occurs at the academy. After the suicide of another teenage prodigy, Aline, an internal investigation begins, and head coach Jeremy is suspended. People suspect that Julie, Jeremy’s favorite student, might know something and hope she will testify. However, Julie remains silent, focusing solely on her practice. The film carefully builds the drama around this sensitive incident, leaving the specifics of emotional domination and abuse that can occur between a teenage female athlete and an adult male coach largely unstated. Through her silence, the violence of pressuring Julie to speak out is suggested. Meanwhile, Julie slowly comes to understand how she should act. The Dardenne brothers participated as co-producers. (LEE Juhyun)

A new film by Iranian director Nader Saeivar, who was invited to the New Currents section in 2022 with No End. While the director portrayed an ironic situation where an innocent citizen had to confess to a crime in No End, this film exposes the unreasonable reality where the law and public power protect the criminal even though someone has witnessed a murder. Although it indirectly criticizes the reality of Iranian society, it’s not just a film with bare political consciousness but one that shows the power of universally relatable characters. The protagonist, Mrs. Ghorbani, is a dignified elderly woman. While taking care of Zara, the daughter of her friend who died in an accident, the old lady is also active in union activities at the school where she has worked for decades. Mrs. Ghorbani visits Zara’s house and notices her husband’s suspicious behavior, realizing that Zara has been killed by her husband. She testifies about the murder to the police, but Zara’s husband claims innocence in various ways. Mrs. Ghorbani repeatedly hits obstacles, but she can’t unsee what she has seen. Her lonely fight for the truth continues. (NAM Dong-chul)

Detective Go Geon-su (Lee Sun-kyun) of the violent crimes unit truly goes all the way. On the day of his mother’s funeral, he hits someone in a traffic accident and covers it up, only to be embroiled in further criminal activities after receiving threats from a witness. Lee Sun-kyun perfectly dominates the film from start to finish as the lead responsible for this entire pandemonium. The actor brilliantly portrays Geon-su, who is visibly anxious, uneasy, and flustered, yet becomes irritable and snappy when cornered - a typical fighting cock who never loses his nerve even in front of the relentlessly aggressive Park Chang-min (Jo Jin-woong). Lee’s energy and way of speaking match perfectly with the character. And it’s not just his one-man show. The acting ensemble in the intense chase and fight scenes, where bodies clash against each other, is also perfectly synchronized in breath and rhythm. (JEONG Jihye)

Shige, an indigenous Ainu person from Shiranuka, Hokkaido, goes Marek fishing with his 10-year-old son Motoki. After praying to the gods dwelling in all things, he skillfully catches a large salmon, which he then prepares for that evening’s meal. The daily life of Shige’s family unfolds like a meticulously crafted narrative film. Rather than highlighting the struggles of the Ainu, who have long lost their territory and now their language, and have faced discrimination, Ainu Puri focuses on the strength and beauty of Shige and Motoki’s life together. Director Fukunaga Takeshi avoids exoticizing or othering the Ainu people and instead captures their journey with a natural, fluid narrative that leads to a certain conclusion. The film’s intelligent and thoughtful gaze creates intriguing shots that evoke a cinematic sense in this modern ethnographic study. (KANG Sowon)

It’s hard to look away from the secretive and interconnected events that unfold. Gangnam B-Side is a crime thriller set against the backdrop of the glamorous Gangnam nightlife, where a series of mysterious disappearances occur. When Jae-hui (Kim Hyungseo) - a well-known hostess at a popular Gangnam nightclub who holds the key to the secrets of these disappearances - goes missing, various characters with different motives and goals become involved in the pursuit of the truth. These include Detective Kang Dong-u (Jo Woojin), who has just returned from demotion, Prosecutor Min Seo-jin (Ha Younkyoung), who sees the case as a stepping stone for her career, and Gangnam outlaw Yoon Gil-ho (Ji Changwook), who voluntarily places himself under suspicion. Gangnam B-Side skillfully unravels the complex web of these characters’ intertwined interests through a gripping narrative and intense, immersive scenarios. The standout performances of the cast bring out the unique personalities of each character, making this a highly polished chase crime drama that transforms the familiar into something refreshingly new. (SONG Kyung-won)

Recording engineer Seong-hyeon is troubled by a request for post-production dubbing. The leading actress, Mi-jeong, has passed away, and no one knows the content of the ad-libs she performed in a crucial scene of the film. Minor actress Min-young visits Seong-hyeon’s studio to record Mi-jeong’s lines, but the director who was supposed to come is nowhere to be found. Humming stimulates a sense of mystery and imagination against the backdrop of a secluded hill and a shabby recording studio. The film intertwines conversations between Seong-hyeon and Min-young, Seong-hyeon’s memories of the deceased Mi-jeong, and scenes from the film Seong-hyeon and Mi-jeong worked on together, placing itself at an angle between reality and cinema, life and death. It unfolds like a languid and bizarre midday farce or a chilling and sorrowful ghost story, gently touching upon the secretive and significant moments of the world. (JUNG Hanseok)

A couple on the brink of breaking up decide to spend one last day together to resuscitate their relationship until sunrise at an inn on the East coast. With just 15 minutes left until sunrise, they wait—perhaps for a breakup or the end of the world. This minimalist film, set in a confined space and filled with close-ups of the two actors, tells a story about light. (KANG Sowon)

Ani is a young Uzbek-American stripper from Brighton Beach, a Russophone enclave in New York City. As she is somewhat conversant in Russian, her boss fixes her up with Russian-speaking clients. After meeting Vanya, the son of a Russian oligarch, a romance kindles that, in addition to his desire to avoid deportation, leads to their elopement. Their fairytale marriage is threatened when Vanya’s parents travel to New York intending to force an annulment. Anora is a 2024 American comedy-drama film written, directed and edited by Sean Baker. Mikey Madison who is in the title role as an exotic dancer delivers a superb performance. Anora premiered this year In Competition at Cannes where it won the Palme d’Or, the first American film to do so since 2011’s The Tree of Life. It earned a 10-minute standing ovation at the end of its screening and became an almost unanimous crowd pleaser. Anora, Sean Baker’s eighth feature film, shows why he is the one of the most beloved American independent filmmakers working today.

From 2014 to 2019, Wang Bing filmed workers in the Chinese garment district of Zhili in Huzhou, Zhejiang Province. In 18,000 workshops, 300,000 migrant workers who have left home to toil for low wages, working 15-hour days. Youth (Hard Times) is the second chapter in the trilogy of films that follow the workers in the workshops of Zhili, following Youth (Spring). This time, the focus is on “money.” A young worker misplaces his wage ledger and pleads with his boss to be paid, only to be ignored. At one factory, the owner fails to pay on Sunday and then disappears, leaving only the unpaid workers behind. In such moments, someone always says, “I should go back home and farm” or “Everyone is like that here.” Another factory sees disputes over overtime pay. When the workers board buses to return home for the Spring Festival, they fall asleep clutching gift packages. A young man sings, “I want to know why you look so sad.” (JUNG Sung-il)