It’s kind of unnerving how all the news right now is either Choi Jin-shil’s sudden death or the 13th Pusan International Film Festival (PIFF), and sometimes while looking through the news listings, it’s easy to confuse the two based on the thumbnail images. (Given the timing, as far as I can see, there were no overlaps in attendees — or at least, very few — between PIFF and Choi Jin-shil’s funeral viewing.)

October 2 saw the opening night to the nine-day festival; PIFF closes on October 10 and is the largest film festival in Korea, and one of the largest in Asia. Over the course of the week, more than 300 films will be screened from 60-plus countries.

Kim Rae-won and Han Eun-jung, above, came as brand models for PIFF sponsor L’Oreal. Other famous name actors showed up to the red carpet night; the opening film was Kazakhstan’s The Gift to Stalin, as well as the Hyun Bin & Lee Bo-young film I Am Happy.

PIFF’s red carpet >>

Tags: Cha Seung-won, Choi Jung-yoon, Choi Kang-hee, Eom Ji-won, Eugene, fashion, film festivals, Go Ara, Gong Hyo-jin, Han Eun-jung, Hyun Bin, Jang Dong-gun, Joo Ji-hoon, Jung Ryeo-won, JYP, Kang Hye-jung, Kim Ji-soo, Kim Jung-eun, Kim Rae-won, Kim So-yeon, Kim Sun-ah, Lee Bo-young, Lee Dong-wook, Lee Jung-jin, Lee Seon-kyun, Lee Wan, Lee Yeon-hee, Oh Ji-ho, Park Eun-hye, Park Hae-il, Park Jin-hee, Shin Hyun-joon, Shin Mina, Song Chang-eui, Yeh Ji-won

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Ara, who’s the current brand model along with Jang Geun-seok for Etude brand cosmetics, shows off what’s being touted as a new “smile with your eyes” ad campaign for the line. The marketing push capitalizes on women’s desires to look like Hyori, Sohn Ye-jin, Seo Min-jung, and other noted eye-smilers — with one magic wave of a cosmetic wand. Tyra would be so proud.

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Ara celebrates being twenty with her first trip as a legal adult, taking off for Tokyo in a program for cable lifestyle channel O’live, She’s O’live: Ara’s Twenty-Year-Old Story (or, Ara’s Story of Being Twenty).

In the program, Ara visits the sights in several of Tokyo’s fashionable districts, stopping by hip spots like the pop artist Yoshitomo Nara’s café and browsing the expensive stores of Harajuku, yes, that home of the uber-trendy fashion aesthetic bastardized by Gwen Stefani. Ara has a chance to show her apparently impressive Japanese skills as well.

Throughout the trip, she tells anecdotes of her life, like this one that surfaced when dropping by a store selling Christmas items (it’s only August!): “When we found out that [SPOILER?] our parents were really Santa, my younger brother and I would pretend to be asleep while my mother set up the presents, and once we even sneaked outside to open our presents, then rewrapped them and went back to sleep.”

The program airs in two segments, the first of which ran August 30, and the second which shows on September 6.

Photos of Ara in Tokyo >>

Tags: Go Ara, reality shows

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Ara (who has for whatever reason dropped her last name, Go, professionally) was appointed a “Swiss Friends” goodwill cultural ambassador (i.e., promo rep) on August 18 at the Swiss embassy in Seoul.

She was greeted by Swiss ambassador Christian Hauswirth (who’s working the skeevy eye in one of the pics below, yeah?). Plus, at the ceremony, the article informs us, Ara partook of a “wonderful cowbell performance.” (HA.) Oh, how that just rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it?

Previous Swiss Friends have included Jang Nara, Choi Su-jong and wife Ha Hee-ra, Kim Tae-hee and brother Lee Wan, and Jo Han-sun.

Via Dipts.com

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Tags: Go Ara

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Vogue celebrates its 12 anniversary with a special spread featuring seven leading ladies styled as film (and TV) figures using the concept “Vogue Fashion Movie.”

Go Ara, above, takes on the Gossip Girl character of Serena van der Woodsen, played by Blake Lively.

Below, Kim Min-hee adopts the Edie Sedgwick look as portrayed by Sienna Miller in the movie Factory Girl; Su Ae dresses as Queen Elizabeth a la Cate Blanchett; Gong Hyo-jin follows Gong Li’s footsteps in Memoirs of a Geisha; Uhm Jung-hwa takes her moniker as Korea’s Madonna literally by taking on Madonna’s Truth or Dare image circa 1990; Seo In-young mimics Renee Zellweger’s Chicago look as Roxie Hart; and Jang Mi-hee styles herself after The Devil Wears Prada.

My vote for best styling goes to Kim Min-hee (here’s Sienna Miller as Edie Sedgwick, and the real-life Edie), though Uhm Jung-hwa’s pulled off her look pretty well, too (the hair! the scary cone bra!).

Tags: fashion, Go Ara, Gong Hyo-jin, Kim Min-hee, photo shoots, Seo In-young, Uhm Jung-hwa

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