EXTRAORDINARY HOST
Korean actors Lee Je Hoon and Park Eun-bin, star of “Extraordinary Attorney Woo,” are set as hosts of the opening ceremony at the Busan International Film Festival. The event will take place on the evening of Oct. 4 at the purpose-built Busan Cinema Center.
Park performed as the first cross-dressing queen in a Korean historical drama with “The King’s Affection” in 2021 and cemented her position as the lead of hit contemporary drama series “Extraordinary Attorney Woo.”
Lee emerged as a rising star with his intense performances in films such as “Bleak Night “(2011), “The Front Line” (2011) and “Architecture 101” (2012). Following that, he showcased a broad range of acting skills in various genres, as seen in films “Anarchist From Colony” (2017), “I Can Speak” (2017) and “Time to Hunt.”
The pair previously shared the screen in the 2014 drama series “Secret Door.“
The festival runs Oct. 4-13.
MIX TAPE MEMORIES
Binge, the streaming arm of Australian pay-TV group Foxtel, Screen Australia and Screen Ireland have green-lighted original drama “Mix Tape.” The four-part miniseries is produced by Foxtel Group, Aquarius Films and Ireland’s Subotica.
Adapted from a novel by Jane Sanderson, and set in Sheffield, England, sets Daniel and Alison, two friends now living on opposite sides of the planet, reconnect through a song from their shared past. They explore their curiosity whether this is the love and life that they were meant to have when they first met in the 1980s.
“Mix Tape” is written by Jo Spain (“Taken Down,” “Sanditon”), and will be directed by Australian director Lucy Gaffy (“Totally, Completely Fine”). The series will be produced by Angie Fielder and Polly Staniford for Aquarius Films and Aoife O’Sullivan and Tristan Orpen Lynch for Subotica. It has major production investment from Foxtel in association with Screen Australia and Screen Ireland. International sales are handed by Eccho Rights.
“’Mix Tape’ is a nostalgic, music-filled love story that will jump off the screen and make you say, what if? A co-production allows us to tell this Australian and international story at a scale that will capture the audience’s imagination and reinforces our commitment to creating premium, must-watch original stories,” said Alison Hurbert-Burns, executive director commissioning, content at Foxtel and Binge.
Aquarius Films’ Angie Fielder and Polly Staniford, and Subotica’s Aoife O’Sullivan and Tristan Orpen Lynch, said, “It’s a classic boy-meets-girl love story with a banging soundtrack that will tug at the heartstrings and have audiences reminiscing and asking themselves: What if you had a second chance at first love?”
ADELAIDE OPENER
The Adelaide Film Festival has announced that Kitty Green’s social thriller “The Royal Hotel,” filmed in South Australia, will be the opening night film of the 2023 festival on Oct. 18. It has its world premiere in Toronto next month.
Julia Garner (“Ozark”) and Jessica Henwick (“Glass Onion”) star as two backpackers who take a job in a remote Australian pub for some extra cash and are confronted with a bunch of unruly locals and a situation that grows rapidly out of their control.
“The Royal Hotel” is produced by Emile Sherman and Iain Canning of See-Saw Films (“The Power of the Dog,” “Lion” “The King’s Speech”) together with Liz Watts (“Animal Kingdom,”” The King”) and Scarlett Pictures’ Kath Shelper (Samson & Delilah).
Green, who co-wrote the script with Oscar Redding (“Van Diemen’s Land”), will attend the opening ceremony along with Garner, Henwick and Hugo Weaving.