[PIFF] Edward Yang as Asian Filmmaker of the Year
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We're going to take you down to Korea's largest port city now, where the annual Pusan International Film Festival or PIFF is under way.
Along with hundreds of movie screenings, PIFF recognizes the greats in Asian cinema, and this year it's the late Taiwanese director Edward Yang.
Yang was known for his portrayal of urban life in Taiwan.
Lee Jeewon was in Busan for this report.
This year's Asian Filmmaker of the Year Award goes to the late Taiwanese director Edward Yang, a pioneer of New Wave Cinema.
Accepting the award on his behalf at the Pusan film fest were his surviving wife Kylie Fung and son Sean.
Taiwanese New Wave Cinema took off amid the rising popularity of Hong Kong films which had dominated Taiwan's film market.
It portrayed Taiwanese life in realistic and down-to-earth ways and adopted innovative narrative techniques, devoid of climax.
While Yang had received many awards including Best Director at Cannes in 2000, his productions are not popular among the general public.
But commercial success was not his priority.
"I don't really think there is a line between artistic and commercial film. Like my late husband always said, there are only good films and bad films. And I think if your film has spoken truly from the bottom of your heart and it touches the heart of your audience, it will sell".
Yang's first job as an engineer was steady and earned him good money but it wasn't enough to satisfy him.
So he asked his architecture-majoring friends whether he should join them because that field seemed closer to art than engineering.
"The friend just looked at him and gave him just one question back, 'If you are an architect, would you still want to make film?' He was actually stunned and paused a while and said I think I would still want to make films".
From then on there was no turning back.
Yang got his break at age 35 and rose quickly into one of the leaders of New Wave Cinema, a chronicle of Taiwan's socio-economic and political transformation in the '80s.
Lee Jeewon, Arirang News.
Video by following the link below
Along with hundreds of movie screenings, PIFF recognizes the greats in Asian cinema, and this year it's the late Taiwanese director Edward Yang.
Yang was known for his portrayal of urban life in Taiwan.
Lee Jeewon was in Busan for this report.
This year's Asian Filmmaker of the Year Award goes to the late Taiwanese director Edward Yang, a pioneer of New Wave Cinema.
Accepting the award on his behalf at the Pusan film fest were his surviving wife Kylie Fung and son Sean.
Taiwanese New Wave Cinema took off amid the rising popularity of Hong Kong films which had dominated Taiwan's film market.
It portrayed Taiwanese life in realistic and down-to-earth ways and adopted innovative narrative techniques, devoid of climax.
While Yang had received many awards including Best Director at Cannes in 2000, his productions are not popular among the general public.
But commercial success was not his priority.
"I don't really think there is a line between artistic and commercial film. Like my late husband always said, there are only good films and bad films. And I think if your film has spoken truly from the bottom of your heart and it touches the heart of your audience, it will sell".
Yang's first job as an engineer was steady and earned him good money but it wasn't enough to satisfy him.
So he asked his architecture-majoring friends whether he should join them because that field seemed closer to art than engineering.
"The friend just looked at him and gave him just one question back, 'If you are an architect, would you still want to make film?' He was actually stunned and paused a while and said I think I would still want to make films".
From then on there was no turning back.
Yang got his break at age 35 and rose quickly into one of the leaders of New Wave Cinema, a chronicle of Taiwan's socio-economic and political transformation in the '80s.
Lee Jeewon, Arirang News.
Video by following the link below
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