2020 PIPFF

Launching this year, International Feature Competition aims to offer an insight into the present and future of global film industry through the works of up-and-coming fine talents. It consists of films largely acknowledged at Venice, Berlin, Sundance and Tallin Black Nights film festivals, most of which are being screened for the first time in Korea.

Senegalese film Nafi's Father skillfully deals with the conflict between two families surrounding a marriage as traditionalism collides with foreign forces. A desperate mother can't stop searching for her missing son in Mexico's borderland (Identifying Features), a young inmate takes a surprisingly intense interest in the sport of rugby in prison (Negative Numbers), and a young woman is accused of killing her wealthy, older husband (Yalda, a Night for Forgiveness). A taxi driver who secretly used to smuggle Mexican migrants into the US gets deported, but keeps on fighting to win back (Tony Driver). A man working in a farm meets an old flame (A Distance Place), while a young woman is simply too exhausted to cope with her mother's tragic death (Dust and Ashes). Finally, in Way Back Home, a couple's peaceful marriage is shattered into pieces when the memory of a sexual assault from long time ago begins to haunt them.

These accounts remind us of life's nature - faced with undesired, often painful things life throws at us, we try desperately to reach the light at the end of the tunnel. Fret not, for that's when the magic of the movies starts.