Korea boosts production support for 16 projects including Koji Fukada film

The Korean Film Council (Kofic) is to share nearly $20m (KRW25.7bn) in production support among 16 mid-budget films, including upcoming features from Cannes award-winner Koji Fukada and Concrete Utopia director Um Tae-hwa.

Kofic launched the funding initiative last year to aid the production of mid-budget films in South Korea and help revitalise the country’s box office, which has struggled to recover post-pandemic.

This supplementary budget is the biggest tranche of funding to date, having launched with a budget of $7.4m (KRW10bn) in 2025 and allocated $15m (KRW19.8bn) in April this year.

The 16 features selected will receive funding based on four bands of production costs.

Group A (net production costs between $1.5-2.2m) comprises five films, which includes Fukada’s Grateful, a Korea–Japan co-production, with Korea as the majority co-production country. Fukada was in Competition at this year’s Cannes with Nagi Notes, having previously won the festival’s Un Certain Regard prize in 2016 with Harmonium. His latest tells a Korean story and is produced by Song Dae-chan and Yuko Kameda.

Also included are Ten Birthdays by Lee Seok-geun (On Your Wedding Day) and Women In A Jar by Baek Seung-bin, whose credits include Busan 2008 award-winner Members Of The Funeral. The group is rounded out by Han Dong-seok horror Ghost Of Bongcheon-dong and Kim Dong-hoon’s Nam Eun-jeong, which has cast Yum Jung-ah and Extraordinary Attorney Woo star Park Eun-bin as mother and daughter.

Six films with net production costs of $2-4.5m were selected. Director E.oni returns with Da Capo following her gay drama Love In The Big City, which screened at Toronto in 2024. Park Dan-hee’s Shake Our Sun stars Lee Do-hyun from horror blockbuster Exhuma and Kim Min-ha who leads this year’s Busan opening film, The Table: Day And Night.

Director Woo Moon-gi and actor Ahn Jae-hong reunite 13 years after The King Of Jokgu for another comedy, Jiangshi: Horror Workshop. Ko Do-won’s Joseon Dynasty crime drama Satto Oh Hoeng-muk, Woo In-beom’s thriller Korean-style Apartment Murder and the drama My Left Arm directed by Cho Jin-mo complete this production tier.

Three films in the $4.5-7m group include Lee Jung-ho’s disaster film Typhoon, starring Han Ji-min and Koo Kyo-hwan; I Am A Firefly by Lee Joon-ik, the director of historical blockbuster King And The Clown; and noir film Cartel, directed by Um Yu-na, the writer of 2017 box office hit A Taxi Driver.

Two titles with net production costs of $7-11m were picked for the final category, which has been temporarily established and will allocate $2.2m in production support to each title.

They include A Good House To Live In (working title), directed by Um Tae-hwa of Concrete Utopia, and stars Hwang Jung-min from Na Hong-jin’s Hope alongside Go Min-si and Eum Moon-seok. The other title is Park Jong-hyun’s directorial feature debut Modub, which stars Yoo Hae-jin from The King’s Warden, Im Si-wan of Squid Game, and Kim So-hyun from Netflix series Love Alarm.

Eight of the 16 films selected were directed by newcomers, exceeding the 30% minimum laid out in the guidelines for the initiative.

Titles to previously benefit from the initiative include July Jung’s Dora, which premiered in Directors’ Fortnight at Cannes, and Kim Jung-hoon’s mystery thriller Final Interview, which is set to premiere at Busan next month.

Article by David Opie.