BIFAN Celebrates Its 30th Anniversary, Amassing 30 Years of Korean Genre Films… Launches “Asian Genre Films 99”

The 30th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BIFAN), held in July, announced on April 24 its three-year project, “Asian Genre Films 99” (Asian Genre Films 99).

“Asian Genre Films 99” is a three-year project that selects 33 Korean genre films each year and introduces a total of 99 films. Over the past 30 years, BIFAN has showcased a wide variety of genre films from around the world. With the goal of mapping out the Asian film landscape from the perspective of “genre,” which is at the core of BIFAN’s identity, and to view these trends in a systematic way, the festival has devised this project.

The 33 Korean genre films selected this year will cover nearly every genre, including horror, thriller, mystery, and action, as well as romance, comedy, melodrama, and youth. The focus is on films in which genre conventions sit at the center of the narrative—works that follow established tropes, reinvent them, or use genre-formalized styles. After creating a comprehensive list spanning those 30 years, the 33-film list of Korean genre films will be finalized through discussions between the selection committee and BIFAN programmers. From there, the project adds a list of 11 genre films made by Korean female directors, and—amid the reality that most genre films are directed by male directors—creates a separate list of works by women directors while tracing their chronology and highlighting key turning points.

After the list is announced in May, during BIFAN, which runs from July 2 to 12, the festival will screen the films and meet viewers through dialogues with audiences, connecting with multiple layers of audience interests.