Busan International Film Festival, October 2-11, 2014

When you live and work in a city, it’s easy to forget all the good things your city has to offer you. Most fall into a daily routine of home to work, neglecting to enjoy their surroundings. Busan is a big city —the second biggest in South Korea!— and home to approximately 3.8 million people. This size offers a lot of kind favors to the city, such as hosting an annual international film festival called BIFF.

I’m ashamed to admit it, but I had never previously watched a movie at BIFF before. I never wanted to put in the effort of figuring out what to watch, obtaining tickets, or getting to the theater. Admittedly, I always felt kind of regretful and dumb, especially when other friends would tell me how great their experience was. Over the years, it’s been hard to avoid as the city has really gotten into it, and it’s even advertised on the subway.

So, this is the year I got into it! I still haven’t figured out how to get advance tickets (which seem to sell out within minutes!), but 20% of the seats are reserved for day-of purchases. You’ll have to go early in the morning to get day-of tickets, but there are lots of good movies to be seen. Very few are the big Hollywood blockbuster types, but there are a lot of interesting up-and-coming directors showing movies, and sometimes even at the movie screenings! Even a mediocre movie is made infinitely more interesting to me when the actors and directors are available to answer my questions during a guest visit.

By not being picky about movie genre or language (since all movies had Korean and English subtitles), I obtained all my tickets from friends or friends of friends. I recommended joining the BIFF TIcket Exchange Facebook Group for buying solo tickets. It was a great experience I really recommend to others. Even if I saw a movie that was kind of a dud, it was fun to think back on and good fodder for conversation.