hankyoreh

The world of international film festivals is always in a state of flux. Berlin, Cannes and Venice stay alert to the rise of their A-list and B-list rivals, even if that means compromising their programming selection with the deployment of defensive strategies. The biggest headache this year is October's launch of the Festa Internazionale di Roma in Italy. Nobody yet knows how its introduction will impact film festivals in nearby Venice or faraway Pusan.

Within Japan there are also upheavals in the film festival infrastructure. The Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF), has lost two of its key sponsors and will have to downsize in October. A satellite event, the Tokyo International Fantastic Film Festival, has announced that it's going on hiatus after hosting twenty-one editions since 1985. The country's only other established genre festival, the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival (1990-), faces its own uncertain future as its host town in northern Japan is effectively bankrupt.

Film culture benefits when dominant festivals have rival events in the same country biting at their heels. The Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) has Tokyo FILMeX which is strong precisely where the more established festival is weak: it has a clear programming identity, the support of filmmakers in the region and a strong retrospective that will tour internationally. The failure of TIFF is that it hasn't reacted to the upstart. In Taiwan, November's Golden Horse Film Festival is facing eclipse by the summer's Taipei Film Festival which tackles head-on the bigger festival's lack of a curated Chinese-language section.

In Korea, the Pusan International Film Festival (PIFF) occupies another stratosphere. The Jeonju International Film Festival (JIFF) and Puchon International Fantastic Film Festival (PiFan) can have little impact on the direction of the larger event. However, having such a strong and worthy opponent has given them a competitive edge in the region as they found ways to survive in the shadow of the dominant festival. PIFF's traditional emphasis on indie Asian cinema has been particularly problematic for JIFF. Korea's official independent film festival countered with original content in its Digital Short Films by Three Filmmakers project, commissions that are guaranteed a world premiere at the festival.

This year's PIFF will introduce a "midnight passion" section, screening genre cinema in late night slots. It's not necessarily a move to squash PiFan, but a reflection of a wider trend in international film festivals that can even be seen at Cannes. Now is an exciting opportunity for PiFan to react by rebranding itself as the region's only major annual genre festival, a move that can help it secure Asian premieres of films such as Taiwan's Silk, Thailand's Dorm and Mexico's Pan's Labyrinth, notable omissions at this year's event.

Since it's first edition in 1997, PiFan has been the only "full service" fantasy festival in Asia. It has international press in attendance, a bilingual catalogue, English-subtitled screenings and the not-to-be-underestimated official festival bag. The quality of the programming has been improving year-on-year despite problems behind the scenes. Perhaps its new uniqueness in the region - as Asia's only surviving genre festival - will give it the confidence to step outside the shadow of PIFF with a new regional remit that can attract press, buyers and programmers in greater numbers and make its second decade even stronger than its first.