Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival

The Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival (부천국제판타스틱영화제), or PiFan, is an international film festival held annually in July in Bucheon, South Korea. Inaugurated in 1997, the festival focuses on South Korean and international horror, thriller, mystery and fantasy films, with particular attention to films from East Asia and Southeast Asia.

The 11th edition of PiFan, held from July 12-21, 2007, featured 214 films from 33 countries.

The 12th edition of PiFan will be held from July 18-27, 2008.

Program

The festival's programming consists of eight sections:
* Puchon Choice
* World Fantastic Cinema
* Fantastic Short Films
* Forbidden Zone
* Family Fanta
* Ani-Fanta
* Special Programs
* Retrospectives

Awards

The festival is non-competitive, except for the Puchon Choice section, in which the "Golden Kebbi" is bestowed the the "Best of Puchon" film.

Boycott

The festival faced a boycott in 2005 to protest what was seen by critics as meddling by Bucheon mayor Hong Geon-pyo. A rival event called RealFanta was organized that year on the same dates as PiFan by former festival director Kim Hong-joon. The festival returned in 2006 without any dispute under the direction of veteran filmmaker Lee Jang-ho and a new programming team. [cite web | last = Paquet | first = Darcy | title = Fest tries to regain fantastic rep | publisher = Variety (magazine) | date = 2006-05-14 | url = http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117943178.html?categoryid=1442&cs=1 | accessdate = 2007-07-12 ]

References

External links

* [http://www.pifan.com Official site]
* [http://www.imdb.com/Sections/Awards/Puchon_International_Fantastic_Film_Festival/ Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival] at the Internet Movie Database
* [http://culturatti.com/2007/09/05/pifan-uncooked/ PIFAN 2007 at The Culturatti]