Tony Leung to be Feted as Asian Filmmaker of the Year at Busan Film Festival

Tony Leung Chiu-wai, the Hong Kong star of “In The Mood For Love” and Marvel’s “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings” has been named Asian Filmmaker of the Year by the Busan International Film Festival. Leung will collect his award at the festival’s opening ceremony on Oct. 5. 2022.

The festival will open with a screening of “Scent of Wind” by Hagi Mohaghegh. The Iranian director previously won the 2015 New Currents competition in Busan with his second feature “Immortal.”

The festival will close with “A Man,” from Japan’s Ishikawa Kei. The title premiered this week at the Venice film festival in the Orrizonti section.

Busan organizers said that the festival will play a total of 243 films (features and shorts) from 71 countries and territories. These include 89 world premieres and 13 international premieres.

After two years of disruptions the festival will operate largely normally. This includes a red carpet opening ceremony, screenings at 30 screens in seven venues, meetings between stars and fans, as well as master classes and special talks.

“All events and parties, including opening and closing ceremonies, are preparing for normal operations. Invitations to overseas guests, accreditation for festival/market badges, and ticketing will progress as in the pre-pandemic years,” organizers said.

The festival announced just two gala screenings — Alain Guiraudie’s “Nobody’s Hero” and Pietro Marcello’s “Scarlet” — but said that six films selected by and starring Leung would also get prestige spots. These include Wong Kar-wai’s “2046,” “Happy Together,” and “In The Mood For Love,” as well as Jeffrey Lau’s “The Eagle Shooting Heroes,” Patrick Yau’s “The Longest Nite” and “Infernal Affairs,” co-directed by Andrew Lau and Alan Mak.

The festival has previously announced the line-up for its two competition sections, New Currents and Jiseok.

Busan’s icons section is an annual festival-of-festivals showcase of works by major international directors. Among the recently premiered films are: Martin McDonagh’s “The Banshees of Inisherin,” Jerzy Skolimowski’s “EO,” Gianni Amelio’s “Lord of the Ants,” Francois Ozon’s “Peter von Kant,” Ruben Ostlund’s “Triangle of Sadness,” Kore-eda Hirokazu’s (Korean-language) “Broker,” Noah Baumbach’s “White Noise” and David Cronenberg’s “Crimes of the Future.” The section also includes one world premiere, “Feast,” by Brillante Mendoza.

The ‘A Window on Asian Cinema’ section is the festival’s widely cast net across other Asian films and filmmakers, containing a mix of recent titles and a handful of world premieres. The section’s premieres include: “Fortune,” by Muhiddin Muzaffar (Tajikistan); Eric Tsang’s “Hong Kong Family”; Indian director Arvind Pratap’s “Mariam”; “Look at Me Touch Me Kiss Me,” from a trio of directors Ho Yuhang, Djenar Maesa Ayu and Kim Tai-sik. Others include Soros Prapan’s Arnold Is A Model Student”; “Kamila Andini’s “Before Now and Then” (aka “Nana”); Ali Abbasi’s Cannes competition film “Holy Spider”; Fukada Koji’s Venice competition title “Love Life”; Li Ruijun’s Berlin competition title “Return to Dust”; and Davy Chou’s “Made in Seoul”.

The Korean Cinema Today section counts three sub-sections: Special premieres, panorama and vision. They provide house room for box office releases such as “Hansan: Rising Dragon” and “A Policeman’s Lineage,” to understated Cannes Critic’s Week drama “Next Sohee,” through to world premieres of “Juhee From 5 to 7” and “A Letter to Kyoto.”

The festival also includes and expands ‘On Screen” a section dedicated to TV series that it launched last year. The nine titles include Lars von Trier’s “The Kingdom Exodus” and eight Asian-made shows, each a world premiere. Among these are Indonesian director Kimo Stamboel’s “Blood Curse” and “Connect,” a Korean-set show made by Japan’s Miike Takashi for Disney Star.

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