Busan International Film Festival Unveils Full 2026 Lineup With ‘Hope,’ ‘The Spiral’ and Genre-Heavy Midnight Program
- Horror Movies Uncut
- 3 hours ago
- 4 min read
The Busan International Film Festival has unveiled the full program for its 31st edition, bringing 315 films to South Korea this October with a lineup that stretches across major international premieres, Asian independent cinema, animation, thrillers and a Midnight Passion program that should be of particular interest to genre audiences.
The 31st Busan International Film Festival runs Oct. 6-15 across 31 screens at eight theaters. The festival lists 246 films from 59 countries among its official selections, including 95 world premieres and 10 international premieres. An additional 69 films will screen through Community BIFF. (Busan International Film Festival)
The festival opens with Kim Jong-kwan’s Korean drama The Table: Day and Night, while the main Competition consists of 14 films representing Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, Iran, Uzbekistan and Indonesia. The broader program spans Gala Presentation, Icons, Vision, A Window on Asian Cinema, Korean Cinema Today, World Cinema, Flash Forward, Wide Angle, Open Cinema, Midnight Passion, On Screen and several special programs. (Busan International Film Festival)
For Horror Movies Uncut readers, one of the most immediately recognizable selections is Na Hong-jin’s Hope. The latest film from the director of The Wailing and The Chaser appears in Korean Cinema Today - Panorama as it continues its festival and theatrical run. (Busan International Film Festival)
Genre programming becomes considerably denser once Busan reaches its Midnight Passion section. The late-night showcase consists of nine films programmed across three nights from Thursday through Saturday, with selections from Korea, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, Canada and Europe. (Busan International Film Festival)
Among them is Ham Tran’s Vietnamese film Red Thread, which will have its world premiere at Busan. BIFF classifies the 126-minute film across crime and violence, religion and spirituality, horror and gore, and revenge, immediately placing it among the festival’s clearest horror selections. (Busan International Film Festival)
Korean filmmaker Lee Hu-bin’s Sapiens will also receive its world premiere in Midnight Passion while appearing in the festival’s Korean Cinema Today - Special Premiere program. BIFF categorizes the 101-minute film as a crime and psychological mystery thriller. (Busan International Film Festival)
Taiwan contributes Wang I-Fan’s The Scar-Faced Cat: Way of Asura, another world premiere. The 108-minute film combines crime, psychological thriller, martial arts and revenge elements, suggesting a different strain of late-night genre filmmaking from the supernatural material elsewhere in the program. (Busan International Film Festival)
Paolo Strippoli’s The Spiral, a 115-minute Italy-France-Belgium production, crosses between Midnight Passion and the festival’s outdoor Open Cinema section. BIFF identifies the film as an adventure, psychological thriller and disaster film. (Busan International Film Festival)
Other Midnight Passion selections include Canadian international premiere L’Autre, Taiwan’s Welcome to Dolly’s House, Japan’s world-premiering The Chain of Roses and French-Belgian production Jim Queen. Welcome to Dolly’s House is an 88-minute animated production that mixes psychological thriller and fantasy elements with coming-of-age, romance and adventure. (Busan International Film Festival)
Busan’s genre footprint extends beyond its midnight selections. A Window on Asian Cinema includes titles such as The Gate of Murder, The Soul Whisperer and Spirit Guardians: The Last Secret of the First Emperor, while Open Cinema includes Thai filmmaker Banjong Pisanthanakun’s Inherit. (Busan International Film Festival)
The festival’s special Japanese animation program also contains several selections likely to cross over with HMU readers. Titled “Masterpieces of Madness, Exhilarating Prospects 12+1,” the retrospective and showcase includes Mamoru Oshii’s Angel’s Egg, Katsuhiro Otomo’s anthology Memories, Masaaki Yuasa’s Mind Game, Eiichi Yamamoto’s Belladonna of Sadness, Shuhei Morita’s Kakurenbo and Shingo Natsume’s new 2026 feature ghost - end of night. The program also includes Metropolis, Phoenix 2772 (Space Firebird), Shiranui, We Are Aliens and A New Dawn. (Busan International Film Festival)
Angel’s Egg receives additional prominence by appearing in Midnight Passion as well, giving Oshii’s surreal 1985 animated film a place within both Busan’s animation celebration and its late-night programming. (Busan International Film Festival)
Elsewhere, the Icons section brings several high-profile filmmakers to the program. David Lowery’s Mother Mary is among the 35 films selected alongside new work from Brad Bird, Pedro Almodóvar, Werner Herzog, Martin McDonagh, James Gray, Asghar Farhadi, Wim Wenders and others. (Busan International Film Festival)
Busan is also dedicating a Special Program in Focus to Michelle Yeoh, this year’s Asian Filmmaker of the Year recipient. “Everything Everywhere All for Michelle” includes Reign of Assassins, Everything Everywhere All at Once, It’s My Time and Sean Baker’s Sandiwara. (Busan International Film Festival)
Special Screenings and Carte Blanche add another group of established titles, including George Miller’s Mad Max, Park Chan-wook’s The Handmaiden and a 4K restoration of Lee Myung-Se’s M. The section also lists Maggie Gyllenhaal’s Flesh Impact among its selections. (Busan International Film Festival)
Taken as a whole, the 2026 program gives genre audiences several different paths through Busan rather than isolating horror within a single section. Midnight Passion remains the obvious starting point, but horror, psychological thrillers, fantasy, animation, revenge cinema and darker genre hybrids can be found throughout the wider selection.
For HMU, Red Thread, Sapiens, The Scar-Faced Cat: Way of Asura, The Spiral, Inherit, The Soul Whisperer, The Chain of Roses and the festival’s Japanese animation program are among the selections worth keeping an eye on as more information emerges. Na Hong-jin’s Hope also gives the Korean lineup a major genre title already positioned for wider international attention.
The 31st Busan International Film Festival runs Oct. 6-15, 2026, in Busan, South Korea.
Explore the complete 2026 Busan International Film Festival lineup
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