‘Squid Game”s Jung Ho-yeon is the first Korean actress to be featured on the ‘TIME100 Next’

Rebecca Souw Achieving a balance between artistic creativity and commercial appeal has been a key component of the success of the Korean film and TV industries, said senior executives at the Asin Contents & Film Market, held this week as part of the Busan International Film Festival. Leading U.S. producer Ted Hope said that “Being audience focused but ambitiously creating authored work,” is significant and that Korean filmmakers are able to tap into a wide range of emotions. Yang Yoomin, a Korean producer who has worked with hit filmmaker Yeon Sang-ho, explained why such a discussion was important. She gave the examples of the Hong Kong and Japanese film industries which have both at times enjoyed international success, but which have recently been eclipsed. Hope said that Hong Kong films and Japanese animation are at opposite ends of the spectrum stretching from commerce and art films, but said that Korean stories demonstrate a balance between authorship and audience-focused approaches.

NCT 127 made their first-ever appearance on The Jennifer Hudson Show with a performance of ‘2 Baddies’, making them the first K-pop act to do so.The boyband appeared on the October 11 broadcast of the American talk show, hosted by singer-actress Jennifer Hudson. NCT 127 performed their latest single ‘2 Baddies’, which first dropped in September as the title track for their fourth full-length album of the same name. Their appearance and performance on The Jennifer Hudson Show mark the first time a Korean pop act has guest-starred on the show.The nine-piece are currently in the US for ‘Neo City – The Link’ concerts in Los Angeles and New Jersey, the latter of which will take place tomorrow (October 13).Their appearance on The Jennifer Hudson Show also comes hot on the heels of their Good Morning America performance of the same song, which was broadcast just a day prior.

pop star Madison Beer (for a performance that won a Webby for Tech Achievement); made Paul McCartney resemble a Beatles-era version of himself; designed a virtual model of the late rapper The Notorious B.I.G.; and, with entertainment mogul Simon Fuller and Verizon, invented an AI-driven alien pop princess named Alta B who appeared with the boy band Now United in their “Jump” video. (With 60 million views, “Jump” is the most-watched video featuring a virtual being.) Signaling confidence in Hyperreal’s continued growth, the Korean giant CJ ENM took a minority stake in Hyperreal in April. The fact that the digital versions of real, flesh-and-blood humans are owned by their real, flesh-and-blood human selves (or their estate) means that they can one day bring those models into other virtual spaces in the metaverse — a critical component to Web3 and the metaverse. Commenting on his strategy for sustaining his company’s growth, Scott emphasized the very thing that makes the Hypermodels so lifelike: human individuality.

Korean series Extraordinary Attorney Woo and Squid Game were the big winners at Busan International Film Festival’s Asia Contents Awards (ACAs), which featured a star-studded red carpet and welcomed back international guests for the first time since the event’s inaugural edition in 2019. Extraordinary Attorney Woo took the Best Content Award, the top prize of the ceremony, as well as Best Actress for Park Eun Bin, who heads the show in the role of a young female lawyer with autism. The series was broadcast in Korea on the ENA cable channel where it set the record for the highest ratings in the channel’s history. Netflix also started streaming the show in select territories from June, after which it topped the streamer’s non-English language weekly rankings for two months straight. Netflix’s Squid Game won the Technical Achievement Award and Best Supporting Actor for Park Haesoo, who plays the childhood friend of Lee Jung-jae’s main character in the Emmy award-winning series. Best Actor was presented to Suzuki Ryohei, star of Japanese series Mobile Emergency Room, which was broadcast on Japanese channel TBS and Disney+, while Best Supporting Actress went to Sora Ma of Singaporean series This Land Is Mine. Best Newcomer went to actress Bao Shang En for Chinese show Love Behind The Melody and actor Yokohama Ryusei for Japan’s The Journalist. China’s Wang Xiaoshuai (So Long, My Son) and Yang Yishu were awarded Best Writer for Wang’s first foray into drama series, The Pavilion, produced by Chinese streamer iQiyi. Chinese actress Fan Bingbing was awarded the ACA Excellence Award.

Lee Jung-jae will get a chance to see the “Squid Game” star in his earliest starring role, as a manipulative male model in 1994’s “The Young Man.” Korean indie distributor and sales agent Mirovision has added the 1994 picture to its sales lineup at the Asian Contents & Film Market, on the sidelines of the Busan International Film Festival. Set in Seoul’s Rodeo Drive district, the film sees Lee play a model trying to break into commercials. After he accidentally kills an agent and dumps the body in a river, he has to turn up the charm to get away with the slaying. The role earned him best new actor awards from four organizations.

North Korea fired an unspecified ballistic missile toward the East Sea on Thursday morning local time, just two days after Pyongyang sent an intermediate-range ballistic missile flying over Japan, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.  About 40 missiles have been launched by North Korea this year, including six in the past two weeks, but Tuesday's test marked the first time in five years that the country has sent a missile over Japan.  The U.S. and South Korea staged joint drills on Wednesday in response, with the USS Ronald Reagan moving into waters east of South Korea.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Next month’s London Korean Film Festival cloaks itself in a panoply of the country’s recent cinema, with a mix of commercial blockbusters, festival titles and documentaries. The long-running event also pays tribute to Kang Soo-youn, the performer who was the first Korean to win a best acting award in Venice and who died in May this year. The event runs from Nov. 3 – 17, 2022 in venues across London and comprises 35 films. It opens with a previously announced screening of “Alienoid.” The Cinema Now section includes: Jeong Ji-yeon’s psychological thriller “The Anchor”; Davy Chou’s “Return To Seoul,” which premiered in Cannes’ Un Certain Regard; Byun Sung-hyun’s “Kingmaker”; “Hot Blooded,” the long-awaited directorial debut by acclaimed novelist and screenwriter Cheon Myeong-kwan; nostalgic road chase movie “Stellar: A Magical Ride”; “Director’s Intention,” by Kim Min-geun.

Netflix has announced the cast for its forthcoming K-drama, Dak Gang Jeong (literal title).According to a report by South Korean media outlet Asian Economy, the streaming platform’s newest Korean series is set to star Kim Yoo-jung (Lovers of the Red Sky), Ahn Jae-hong (Be Melodramatic) and Ryu Seung-ryong (Jirisan).ASTRO’s Cha Eun-woo was reportedly in talks to join the cast, but no decision has been reached regarding this offer at the time of publication.Based on a webtoon named after a Korean chicken dish, Dak Gang Jeong is a comedy surrounding a machine that turns people into fried chicken. Kim is set to play Min Ah, a girl who is turned into fried chicken after mistaking the machine for one that helps people with fatigue.Ryu will be playing Choi Sun-man, a father who will do anything to reverse the machine’s effects on his daughter; while Ahn will be playing Go Baek-joon, an intern with a crush on Min Ah.Dak Gang Jeong will be helmed by Lee Byung-hun, who has previously worked with several members of the cast—namely Ryu on the 2019 film Extreme Job and Ahn on 2019 K-drama Be Melodramatic.

Asian Contents & Film Market (ACFM), the industry platform of Busan International Film Festival (BIFF), is making a return as a fully-fledged in-person event this year, after being mostly held online for two years during the pandemic.

Creating locally authentic content has been key to Netflix’s success in producing shows in Asia that have resonated globally, according to Minyoung Kim, Netflix Vice President of Content, APAC ex India, speaking at APOS, which is taking place virtually and in-person in Singapore this week (September 27-29).

Alicia Hannah-Kim’s latest role as the first female sensei in Netflix’s may give observers the false impression that she’s an overnight success.

Netflix has shared a first look at the upcoming original Korean film 20th Century Girl, which follows the lives and loves of 17-year-old girls in 1999.The extended preview was shared as part of the streaming platform’s TUDUM event today (September 24), in which upcoming content for the rest of 2022 and beyond was revealed.The film was introduced by All Of Us Are Dead star Cho Yi-hyun, who described it as “depicting friendships and first love of 17-year-old girls”. “The movie is titled 20th Century Girl, starring Kim Yoo-jung,” she added.

Netflix has shared a previously unseen clip from Squid Game season one at its TUDUM preview event today (September 24).The streaming platform is sharing first looks at some of its upcoming programmes around the world, kicking off with a section dedicated to its Korean slate.At the end of the Korean segment, Squid Game director Hwang Dong-hyuk appeared in a video message. “I’d like to thank all the Netflix fans around the world again for loving Squid Game,” he said.

Minari has been released by A24, available in both English and Korean translations.The 320-page book features director and writer Lee Isaac Chung’s never-before-published alternate ending to the 2020 film, which starred Steven Yeun, Han Ye-ri, Alan Kim, Noel Kate Cho, Youn Yuh-jung and Will Patton.Other contents in the book include an original essay by Vietnamese American poet Ocean Vuong, a poem by Claude Wilkinson, and annotated photographs from Chung’s own childhood family albums.Yeun, who plays Jacob, also provides a foreword, which reads: “Isaac is a beautiful writer. When I first read his script, I remember feeling so moved.

Anna Tingley If you purchase an independently reviewed product or service through a link on our website, Variety may receive an affiliate commission. The Emmy-winning Netflix series “Squid Game” is set be the most popular TV-inspired Halloween for the second year in a row. According to data collected by CasinoTop10, Squid Game costumes outnumbered Google searches for any other film and TV character costumes, beating out other popular costume inspo such as Harley Quinn, Cruella, Spiderman, the Joker and more. In the ultra-popular series, hundreds of debt-ridden people sign up to compete in order to win a life-changing cash prize.

Hwang Dong-hyuk says there’s room in the future seasons of Squid Game for Leonardo DiCaprio to join in.

EXCLUSIVE: The prevalence of Korean projects heading to the U.S. continues.

Major Hollywood actors including Leonardo DiCaprio will “probably” become part of Squid Game if there is a third season, according to the show’s Emmy-winning director Hwang Dong-hyuk, who said Netflix has upped budget for season two and he has now settled on the games.

Rebecca Souw Leonardo DiCaprio could be invited to join the cast of Netflix’s Emmy winning global smash hit “Squid Game” in a future season, series writer-director Hwang Dong-hyuk has said. At a Netflix-hosted congratulatory press conference in Seoul on Friday, when asked if any known Hollywood actor would star in “Squid Game” Season 2, Hwang said: “There will be no known Hollywood actor in Season 2. That’s not in the plan and if the stage changes, maybe in Season 3 – but for Season 2, it is still set in Korea. Leonardo DiCaprio did say he’s a big fan of ‘Squid Game,’ so maybe if time or chances allow, we can ask him to join the games.”