The Market Monitor Minding the Nation's Business
by Boy Villasanta
No other than Roger Garcia, the Advisor of the prestigious Asian Film Awards, is the Dean of the 2024 Fantastic Film School of the 28th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BIFAN) in Bucheon City, South Korea whose academy scholarship starts today, 4th of July and ends on the 10th July, 2024.
Garcia is one of the most highly esteemed international filmmakers who once directed the Hong Kong International Film Festival.
Aside from the AFA, Roger is also an Advisor at the Udine Far East Film Festival, the International Film Camp, London East Asia Film Festival.
Garcia is also a film and TV producer and film critic. His latest film, “The Once and Future,” was selected for the Singapore International Arts Festival in 2022 and the Hong Kong New Vision Arts Festival in 2023.
He is also a book author. His “Out of the Shadows: Asians in American Cinema” has been published by prestigious institutions including the British Film Institute, Cahiers du Cinema and the Locarno International Film Festival.
At present, he is the Chief Operating Executive of General Film Services.
According to the 28th BIFAN, he deserves to be the Dean of the 2024 FFS because of his intensive and extensive knowledge, theoretically and practically, of filmmaking and organizing film festivals. “…Garcia has contributed significantly to discovering and promoting outstanding Asian films,” noted the BIFAN news.
For him, international film festivals are significant it their contributions to the development of movie industries in all parts of the world. “Nowadays, film festivals are not only a promotional tool for commercial success, but also an essential platform for emerging filmmakers and independent producers,” he emphasized.
In the course of the studies, the thirty-one students selected this year will be educated and well-equipped with the necessary tools in creating genre filmmaking.
Together with Dean Garcia, the other lecturers in the FFS are Barry Sabath, professor, producer and film historian at the American Film Institute. Barry is also an Executive at Walt Disney and Blue Wolf Productions, among others. He was the 2023 Dean of FFS; Chris Lee, Founder and Director of Academy for Creative Media at the University of Hawaii. Lee is the President for Production of Tristar Pictures and Columbia Pictures. He was Executive for the award-winning films “Philadelphia,” “Jerry Maguire” and “As Good as It Gets”; Evrim Ersoy, Head of Programming of “Beyond Fest.” Among others, Ersoy is Producer of “Hostile Dimensions” and “To Fire You Come at Last”; Korean educators and filmmakers Sungho Kim, Chugye University of the Arts Graduate School, Professor at the Department of Creative Writing. Among Sungho’s awards include Best Creative Award for Netflix at Busan International Film Festival Asia Contents Awards in 2021, Silver Raven Award at the 2014 Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival etc. and Steve M. Choe, Korean University of Arts School of Film, TV and Multimedia, Filmmaking Department. He’s a Professor for Editing. Choe is Founder of C-47 Post Studio and is involved in many media arts productions.
“Now in its 17th year, The Fantastic Film School is a genre film production education and networking program for emerging filmmakers from all over the world. Internationally acclaimed filmmakers participate as instructors, giving lectures and masterclasses that cover all aspects of filmmaking, from development to distribution and marketing. Participants can present their own projects and receive mentoring. The program also provides opportunities for networking among instructors and participants,” explained BIFAN News.
Meanwhile, Jongsuk Thomas Nam, BIFAN Plus Organizer added: “Over the past 16 years, a total of 370 students have graduated from the NAFF Fantastic Film School. Their films have been selected for prestigious film festivals such as Berlinale, Sundance or Sitges, gaining worldwide attention. This year, the Fantastic Film School will once again provide high-quality lectures and close mentoring from renowned Korean and international film industry experts. We will work with the instructors to create a fruitful curriculum that will provide even more substantial help to the participants.”
The FFS is being at the at the Webtoon Convergence Center (17, Gilju-ro, Bucheon City.
Meanwhile, the 2024 BIFAN kicks off today, July 4 and wraps ups on July 14, 2024.