Zhang Yimou Named Busan Competition Jury President — SkimNews
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- Zhang Yimou was named Jury President for the main competition at the Busan International Film Festival (October 6-15), heading a seven-member jury in the section's second edition.
- Bi Gan, Moon Choi, Kei Ishikawa, July Jung, Tran Thi Bich Ngoc, and Samal Yeslyamova join Zhang on the competition jury, each with a recent or current festival title — Bi Gan's Resurrection competed in Busan last year, Moon Choi produced and acts in this year's Bedford Park.
- The jury will evaluate 13 previously announced competition features and hand out five prizes — Best Film, Best Director, Special Jury Prize, Best Actor, and Artistic Contribution — sharing total cash prize money of $80,000 (KRW110m).
- Zhang Lu's Gloaming In Luomu won Best Film at last year's inaugural fully-fledged Busan competition, the first such edition in the festival's history.
- Following Academy Awards rule changes introduced in May, Busan's Best Film winner will now be automatically submitted to the Best International Feature category at the Oscars.
- The festival also named juries for its Vision-Asia section (NETPAC: Nina Kochelyaeva, Matthew Poon, Lee Dongha; FIPRESCI: Ma Xingxu, Teresa Vena, Roh Chul-Hwan), the BIFF Mecenat Feature Documentary Award (Rintu Thomas, Kim Taeil, Zhou Hao), and the Sonje Award (Anuparna Roy, Abinash Bikram Shah, Lee Ranhee).
Why it matters: With the May Academy Awards rule change, the Busan Best Film winner now auto-enters the Best International Feature race — meaning Zhang Yimou's jury isn't just deciding $80,000 in prizes but also effectively selecting an Oscar contender from 13 features. For filmmakers competing in this second-ever Busan competition, the stakes now reach far beyond the Korean festival.
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