Projecting Asian Cinema to the World

Abstract

This chapter examines Unheeded Cries, South Korea's official submission to the fourth San Francisco International Film Festival (SFIFF) in 1960, which tells the story of postwar orphans in the slums of Seoul. It discusses the Berlinale, San Francisco, and Asian Film festivals that consistently invited South Korean films to their competition sections during the first half of the 1960s. It also mentions the occupied force's cultural representative, Oscar Martay, who promoted Berlin as the Western cultural showcase of the East. The chapter reviews how SFIFF was organized and managed by Irving “Bud” Levin, whose ultimate aim was to raise his profile to become an international-level figure. It elaborates the Asia Foundation's (TAF) attempt to use SFIFF to showcase non-communist and ideologically correct Asian films for mainstream American society.