ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to analyze the role and relevance of Korean cinema in the context of a film festival held annually in Japan, the Osaka Asian Film Festival (OAFF). By identifying the city of Osaka and the Japanese film industry as the main stakeholders of the festival and understanding their real interests, the chapter demonstrates how screening and celebrating high-quality films from South Korea ultimately creates a contradiction in terms of the stakeholders’ goals, namely to boost their own economic performance, create new opportunities to collaborate with partners in Asia and raise the share of Japanese films both domestically and abroad. As one of the major cinemas in the world, however, Korean cinema remains important for the framing of the festival as internationally competitive and a space for the discovery of and support for new talent, as well as a place for intellectual exchange, where issues such as the colonial history of Japan and the victimization of Korea can be addressed through the medium of film.
