On October 8, the 14th Pusan International Film Festival, or PIFF, opened in Busan. (Yes, the city takes a different official spelling than the film festival. Blame inconsistent Romanization.)

As the largest film festival in Korea, it drew a large list of attendees, as you can see from the long list of red-carpet walkers. It was definitely a star-studded opening night, and even included one familiar Hollywood face (Josh Hartnett).

This year’s PIFF features its largest lineup to date, screening 355 films from 70 countries, and closes on the 16th.

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This was pretty much inevitable, and comes as no surprise: MBC has ordered 12 more episodes for its highly successful historical drama Queen Seon-deok, currently sitting with a comfortable lead on Mondays and Tuesdays, with ratings past 40%. This extension brings the episode total up from the originally planned 50 to 62.

A representative from MBC’s drama department said, “We had discussed extending Queen Seon-deok by 14 to 16 episodes, but in the end we decided upon 12 episodes. Giving consideration to the airing of awards ceremonies and year-end special broadcasts, we estimate that we can air about 62 episodes of this drama.” That means Queen Seon-deok, which premiered on May 25, will wrap up its run neatly by the end of the year, on December 22.

The drama is now just under halfway done, with its title character (Lee Yo-won playing Princess Deok-man) finding her way as a princess and growing into her status, opposite her rival Mi-shil (Go Hyun-jung). The drama also got a jolt of energy with the recent entrance of Kim Nam-gil as the complicated Bi-dam, Mi-shil’s now-grown secret son, whom she abandoned in her quest for power.

Via Hankyung

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Kim Haneul and Kang Ji-hwan

Did the Blue Dragon Awards sneak up on us this year or what?

As one of the largest year-end awards shows, the Blue Dragon always tends to draw out a good number of A-listers, and we saw plenty of them out on the red carpet on November 20 and posing pretty for photos.

One big winner of the night was the “kimchi Western” The Good, The Bad, The Weird, as was the thriller The Chaser and even the sports movie Forever the Moment, from way back in January.

But, as with any awards show, sometimes the fun is less about the actual awards and more about parsing all the red carpet looks.

More photos! (May take a while to load) >>

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I’d wondered why actor Kim Nam-gil, who had gone by the name “Lee Han” for the past few years, suddenly reverted to a different name, particularly when his career was beginning to take off.

He was “Lee Han” until his role in 2008’s Public Enemy Returns, after which point he reverted to his real name (he may be more recognizable in the pic to the right; his new look had me double-taking to make sure it was really him, and the name change didn’t help!). Other projects he’s done as Lee Han include dramas When Spring Comes, Lovers, and Goodbye Solo.

But he’s used Kim Nam-gil ever since, with subsequent films Modern Boy and Portrait of a Beauty. He’s picked up something of a reputation as “Chungmuro’s dark horse,” and he’s seems poised for a big career; keep an eye out for him in the future.

One reason for his initial name change to Lee Han was that as a new actor at MBC, he’d often encounter the similarly named veteran comic actor Kang Nam-gil (Who Are You, Gourmet). But after using a stage name for a while, he began to feel a desire to use his real name: “I felt that acting under my birth name would make me be more honest with myself.”

At around the time he started feeling that way, directors Kang Woo-seok (producer of Modern Boy) and Jung Ji-woo (Modern Boy writer and director), as well as actor Seol Kyung-gu (Public Enemy Returns), encouraged him to revert to using his real name. “As I started using my real name, I felt I was starting anew. It allowed me to feel more humble and gave me the opportunity to be harder on myself, which is satisfying on a personal level.”

Via E Daily

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The film Portrait of a Beauty [미인도] held its press conference and VIP preview on November 4, and a bevy of VIPs showed up to catch an advance look at the risqué period film. It has attracted much comparison to the drama series Painter of the Wind (see trailer below), as both deal with the life of the Joseon artist Shin Yoon-bok. They also seem to share a similar cinematic flair, although obviously there are key differences between a film and a drama series.

The cast also talked to reporters at a press conference, led by lead star Kim Min-sun and her co-stars Kim Young-ho, Chu Ja-hyun, and Kim Nam-gil, who for some reason has changed his stage name from Lee Han (of Goodbye Solo, When Spring Comes). I don’t get this whole changing-names-mid-career thing (see also: Go Jun-hee). Why bother at this point?

Portrait of a Beauty opens to the public on November 13.

More from the VIP event >>

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