Latest news with #Heo
United News of India
19-07-2025
- Sport
- United News of India
Australia outlasts S. Korea to reach FIBA Women's Asia Cup final
Shenzhen, July 19 (UNI) Australia advanced to the final with an 86-73 victory over South Korea here today at the FIBA Women's Asia Cup. Chasing its first Women's Asia Cup title, Australia took the early initiative and held off a determined South Korean fightback to secure the win. Australia dominated the boards with a 45-26 rebounding advantage. Cayla George posted a double-double of 20 points and 13 rebounds, while four other Australian players also scored in double figures. "We knew that we had to lock in defensively and have a good game plan from the very start. We got a great start, and then offensively the ball didn't start moving. They started to shoot the ball well, so we had to make some adjustments at halftime defensively," Australia coach Paul Goriss said. "The girls came out in the second half with a greater intentional defense with our ball pressure and stayed connected with our switching." Isobel Borlase opened with six straight points, sparking a 15-0 run over four minutes that gave Australia a 19-5 lead and forced South Korea to call a timeout. South Korea responded as Choi I-saem and Heo Ye-eun combined for eight points to keep the game within reach. The first quarter ended with Australia leading 22-13. Australia caught fire from beyond the arc as Stephanie Reid and Sara Blicavs hit three consecutive 3-pointers. South Korea, known for its outside shooting, answered with three straight of its own from Choi, Park Ji-hyun and Heo to cut the gap to four. South Korea made eight of 15 attempts from long range in the first half, compared to Australia's 38.5 percent from deep, but Australia still held a narrow 42-38 lead at halftime. In the second half, South Korea was limited to just three 3-pointers. Australia broke the game open with a 16-4 run in the third quarter to lead 62-48. As South Korea's shooting cooled down, Australia leaned on its physicality and tempo to push the lead to as many as 15 points with five minutes remaining. Heo and Shin Ji-hyun sparked a brief rally with fast-break points, but Australia responded quickly with a series of inside attacks to maintain control. Heo finished with 20 points for South Korea, while Park added 19. Despite the loss, South Korea coach Park Soo-ho praised his players' performance. "Australia is one of the strongest teams in this competition, but our players executed what I had asked them very well on the court," he said. Australia last reached the final in 2017, the year it debuted in the tournament. Looking ahead to Sunday's final, Goriss said, "We still have one more job to do: we want to go home with the gold medal. We've been playing some great basketball right from the very time that we landed in China. We are really deep with our depth and rotation." UNI/XINHUA BM
Korea Herald
03-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Korea Herald
Heo Ga-young didn't expect to get on course —then she won at Cannes
From a no-budget short film to La Cinef's top prize, the director reflects on her creative journey and the uncertain road ahead When Heo Ga-young applied to the Korean Academy of Film Arts with a bare-bones seven-minute film about sweet and sour pork, she figured she'd blown it. The school was Korea's most prestigious film program, the kind of place where industry veterans compete for spots alongside wannabe auteurs hoping to follow alumni like Bong Joon-ho. Her portfolio consisted of two amateur actors arguing over the ubiquitous Korean-Chinese dish — specifically, whether to pour the sauce on top or dip each piece. Total budget: basically nothing. Film background: some homemade clips and scripts, but nothing that really counted. "Some interviewers asked if I was mocking the school. Another said I had serious nerve," she says over coffee in Seoul. It was, she later learned, the shortest and cheapest submission in KAFA history. Then Jung Sung-il spoke up. Korea's most respected film critic and instructor at KAFA — the one cinephiles quote chapter and verse — saw something different. "He told me he didn't have questions, just advice. He said I was a genius, that I needed to make films, that most people wouldn't love my work but the ones who did would be obsessed with it forever." She laughs at the memory. "I had no clue who he was. Just this old guy being weirdly nice." Two years later, Heo's graduation film "First Summer" won the top prize at the Cannes International Film Festival's La Cinef competition, a competitive showcase for film school students, making her the first Korean filmmaker to take the top honor. It was also the only Korean film at Cannes this year — a lonely victory for a Korean film industry that is increasingly anxious about its global standing. The path from that strange interview to Cannes began, as these things often do, with family. While an undergraduate student at Yonsei University, Heo was assigned to interview an elderly person for a class project. She chose her grandmother, a woman she'd lived with as a teenager but never really understood. "I thought she didn't love me," Heo says. "Korean grandmothers are supposed to be warm, cooking for their grandchildren. Mine was cold, kind of twisted. She never made me a single meal. Did face masks every night but wouldn't share even one with her granddaughter." The conversation changed everything. "First thing out of her mouth: 'I have a boyfriend but can't reach him, so I'm taking sleeping pills because I'm so worried.' In that moment, I saw her for the first time — not as my grandmother or my mother's mother, but as a woman. My whole concept of elderly people just flipped upside down." That revelation sent Heo prowling Busan's streets, notebook in hand. She struck up random conversations with elderly people on street corners, visited the city's "colatecques" -- dance clubs where seniors socialize over Coke instead of alcohol. The first few times, she got turned away for being too young. "Once they heard I was making a film about elderly people, everything changed," she said. "They told me personal stories, became extras in the film, lent me their clothes." The colatecques revealed their own logic, their own culture. Open during daylight hours, closing by six so grandmothers could get home to cook dinner. Coffee from vending machines, trot music on the speakers, and that particular intimacy of partner dancing. "An old man asked me to dance, and suddenly his face was right there in front of mine. That's when I understood what having a dance partner means at that age. It's not about romance. It's about feeling alive, being a social creature, that physical struggle against disappearing." Her first draft told the story from a granddaughter's perspective — a young woman trying to understand her eccentric grandmother. Everyone loved it: The actors loved it, the school loved it. Heo had doubts. "I realized I was objectifying her all over again, romanticizing old age through my twentysomething lens. The story began with my grandmother's actual life. The moment I made it fake, the film would fail." A month before production, she rewrote everything from the grandmother's perspective. "The staff lost their minds," she says. The final version follows Yeong-sun, played with fierce dignity by veteran actor Heo Jin, as she chooses between attending her granddaughter's wedding and her younger boyfriend's funeral (spoiler alert: She picks the funeral). What unfolds is a portrait of grief, desire and late-life self-discovery that refuses to look away from its subject's complexity. At Cannes, the jury — including German filmmaker Maren Ade, whose "Toni Erdmann" Heo had studied obsessively in school — raved about the film. "They kept saying they loved it, love with a capital L," Heo recalls. But the real validation came from audiences at the post-ceremony screening in Paris. "Elderly women thanked me for making them protagonists. People said they needed to call their grandmothers immediately. One person said, 'Thank you for telling a story that isn't fake.' As a filmmaker, you can't ask for more than that." The warmth of that reception couldn't mask the reality Heo returned to in Korea. The film industry she'd entered two years ago is struggling to find its post-pandemic footing. Box office numbers remain sluggish, screen monopolies by a few blockbusters has worsened, and government funding for the arts has been slashed. Young directors are entering an industry that claimed to want fresh voices while demanding increasingly formulaic products. "They tell us in school to develop our unique vision, our own cinematic language," Heo says. "Then you graduate and realize the market only wants copies of what worked last year. You watch your seniors compromise until their films could be directed by anyone." Which made Monday's meeting at the Presidential Office all the more surreal. President Lee Jae-myung had gathered Korea's recent international award winners — including Tony Award-winning musical writer Park Chun-hue, Prix de Lausanne ballet champion Park Youn-jae and world-renowned soprano Jo Sumi. Heo sat among them as Korean cinema's sole representative, there because her student film had salvaged some pride for an industry shut out of every major film festival this year. The president's first words to her landed with perfect irony: "I hope you'll succeed as a commercial filmmaker." Heo wanted to ask what he meant by commercial. Instead, with cameras rolling and officials watching, she talked about the crisis eating Korean cinema alive. How film schools train directors to develop unique voices, how the industry claims to want innovation, but how market realities force young filmmakers into predetermined molds. "We lose our cinematic language trying to fit into boxes labeled 'profitable,'" she said. She made her pitch: Adopt the French model where blockbuster profits fund diverse filmmaking through taxation and redistribution. "Audiences are smarter than we think. They recognize good stories. But those stories have to exist first. When you maintain a steady supply of diverse films, the culture survives. In France, people still see movies as art, still go on dates to the cinema, because that ecosystem exists." The cameras rolled, ministers nodded politely, and Heo stumbled through her prepared remarks, forgetting half of what she had planned to say. "I was so nervous," she says. "All those cameras, all that pressure to represent an entire industry in crisis. I always thought I thrived onstage — guess not." That pressure reflects something deeper about the way Heo approaches her work. Throughout the interview, she returns repeatedly to broader questions of purpose and ethics. It would be reductive to label this activism — filmmakers create, and it would be blasphemous to suggest otherwise. But it's hard to miss how deeply Heo's awareness of cinema's social dimensions shapes her work. When sustainable filmmaking in financial terms is mentioned, she immediately pivots to environmental concerns — the mountains of waste generated after each shoot. When discussing "First Summer," she frames it in terms of violence of representation and the filmmaker's accountability. "Film is inherently violent," she says. "You're in a dark room, experiencing a director's world one-sidedly for hours. People pay money, give their time. We owe them something meaningful in return. Having a platform means having power. I feel that weight constantly." That weight drives the two scripts she's currently developing — one about a middle-aged female bassist, another about a couple trafficking abortion pills. But drive alone doesn't secure anything. Despite the Cannes victory and fawning media coverage, despite the presidential photo op and industry acclaim, Heo knows her future remains as precarious as any young filmmaker's. "We all live with this low-grade panic," she says. "Winning at Cannes was an incredible honor, but it guarantees nothing about my next film getting made. I constantly hear about projects being cancelled. I see directors becoming replaceable parts in an assembly line. The fear is that I've finally found my voice, and I'll have to lose it just to survive." "First Summer" will get a limited theatrical release in Korea next month, part of ongoing negotiations between KAFA and distributors. Theater chain representatives declined to comment on the matter. It's an important progress and victory for a student film that might otherwise struggle to find an audience, but hardly a career guarantee for Heo. Asked if she is optimistic about cinema's future, particularly in an era of shrinking attention spans and binge-watching, Heo doesn't hesitate. "Honestly? I'm pretty pessimistic." She pauses, reconsidering. "But I think every artist secretly harbors hope. Why else would we do this? We believe our work might shift something in the world, even if slightly. Film is becoming niche culture — maybe that's inevitable. But we still have to try." She finishes her coffee and shrugs.
West Australian
24-06-2025
- Entertainment
- West Australian
WA's Best Steak Sandwich Competition: JunHwi Heo from the Treendale Farm Hotel takes out country category
JunHwi Heo is looking forward to a good night's sleep after weeks of tossing and turning in bed wondering if his Asian twist on a pub staple would be enough to secure the title of WA's best steak sandwich. But Mr Heo — the head chef at Treendale Farm Hotel — proved his unique recipe had what it takes to hand the Australind pub back-to-back titles. The country category winner of the Australian Hotels Association WA and Little Creatures WA's Best Steak Sandwich competition was lost for words after his creation won the coveted crown. 'The last couple of weeks I couldn't go to bed, I was really stressed and nervous, but now I can go to bed,' he said. 'There's nothing more that I can say to express my emotion right now, I'm just so happy.' He said his decision to steer away from traditional ingredients 'really paid off'. 'I tried to make a different type of steak sandwich,' Mr Heo said. 'I used no fresh tomato, no rocket, no usual stuff, 'I focused on a rich smokey flavour, there is a side sauce for the chips that has smoked onion in it. 'And another stand out was the kimchi relish, which means that it's a little bit of Asian style so it was a little bit spicy.' Mr Heo's winning sanga also featured a Turkish roll, South West black Angus scotch fillet, two slices of cheddar cheese, Rocky Ridge homemade BBQ sauce and sweet and spicy mayo. It was served with smoked pickled onion coleslaw, crumbed green bean and chips. Last year, The Treendale Farm Hotel's chef Gayan Dilruk Geeeganage's winning sandwich contained scotch fillet steak, cheddar cheese, bacon jam, aioli, Beerfarm pale ale brined crispy onions, rocket, tomato, and pickles, served with chips and a herb and mustard dipping sauce. The pub has made more than 450 steak sandwiches a week since last year's win and visitors from far and wide are expected to keep rolling through to try its latest winning sanga But Mr Heo is not resting on his laurels and is already excited to get started on a recipe for next year. 'This means a lot for our restaurant, it is a really big celebration for us,' he said. 'I can't wait to keep pushing and creating for next year with my Sou chef.' The Treendale Farm Hotel was up against The Miners Rest Motel in Kalgoorlie, Margaret River's Settlers Tavern and the Exchange Hotel in Pinjarra. Each chef had 13 minutes to make two steak sandwiches, one for the judges and one for the audience. The winning steak sandwich was worth $34 — the most expensive of the lineup — and took the longest to make. Mr Heo finished cooking with just seconds to spare. The drooling audience celebrated loudly as his steak sizzled on the grill and salivated as Mr Heo's sandwich was passed through the crowd. Judges were asked to assess each sandwiches presentation, originality, chips, sauces, flavour, value for money, and most importantly, the meat's tenderness. AHA WA executive officer Bradley Woods was one of four judges who agreed the 'fangability' of the sandwich was crucial. ''Fangability' is the tear factor, you don't want the sandwich to fall apart when you bite into it,' he said. 'I also don't want sauce running down my hands, the chefs have to balance everything just right.' Mr Woods said the annual competition puts not just the winner but all competitors 'on the map'. 'The great West Australian steak sandwich competition is alive and well in our country pubs,' he said. 'All the chefs did an amazing job and I congratulate them all.' The competition — which has been running for 18 years — was held inside the Crown Towers ballroom as part of the 2025 AHA hospitality expedition.
Perth Now
24-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
The $34 steak sandwich crowned best in Country WA
JunHwi Heo is looking forward to a good night's sleep after weeks of tossing and turning in bed wondering if his Asian twist on a pub staple would be enough to secure the title of WA's best steak sandwich. But Mr Heo — the head chef at Treendale Farm Hotel — proved his unique recipe had what it takes to hand the Australind pub back-to-back titles. The country category winner of the Australian Hotels Association WA and Little Creatures WA's Best Steak Sandwich competition was lost for words after his creation won the coveted crown. 'The last couple of weeks I couldn't go to bed, I was really stressed and nervous, but now I can go to bed,' he said. 'There's nothing more that I can say to express my emotion right now, I'm just so happy.' He said his decision to steer away from traditional ingredients 'really paid off'. Treendale Farm Hotel winning steak sandwich. Credit: Andrew Ritchie 'I tried to make a different type of steak sandwich,' Mr Heo said. 'I used no fresh tomato, no rocket, no usual stuff, 'I focused on a rich smokey flavour, there is a side sauce for the chips that has smoked onion in it. 'And another stand out was the kimchi relish, which means that it's a little bit of Asian style so it was a little bit spicy.' Mr Heo's winning sanga also featured a Turkish roll, South West black Angus scotch fillet, two slices of cheddar cheese, Rocky Ridge homemade BBQ sauce and sweet and spicy mayo. It was served with smoked pickled onion coleslaw, crumbed green bean and chips. Last year, The Treendale Farm Hotel's chef Gayan Dilruk Geeeganage's winning sandwich contained scotch fillet steak, cheddar cheese, bacon jam, aioli, Beerfarm pale ale brined crispy onions, rocket, tomato, and pickles, served with chips and a herb and mustard dipping sauce. Chef Jui Hwi Heo at WA's Best Steak Sandwich Competition where he took out first place. Credit: Andrew Ritchie The pub has made more than 450 steak sandwiches a week since last year's win and visitors from far and wide are expected to keep rolling through to try its latest winning sanga But Mr Heo is not resting on his laurels and is already excited to get started on a recipe for next year. 'This means a lot for our restaurant, it is a really big celebration for us,' he said. 'I can't wait to keep pushing and creating for next year with my Sou chef.' The Treendale Farm Hotel was up against The Miners Rest Motel in Kalgoorlie, Margaret River's Settlers Tavern and the Exchange Hotel in Pinjarra. Each chef had 13 minutes to make two steak sandwiches, one for the judges and one for the audience. The winning steak sandwich was worth $34 — the most expensive of the lineup — and took the longest to make. Mr Heo finished cooking with just seconds to spare. Chef Jui Hwi Heo at WA's Best Steak Sandwich Competition where he took out first place Credit: Andrew Ritchie The drooling audience celebrated loudly as his steak sizzled on the grill and salivated as Mr Heo's sandwich was passed through the crowd. Judges were asked to assess each sandwiches presentation, originality, chips, sauces, flavour, value for money, and most importantly, the meat's tenderness. AHA WA executive officer Bradley Woods was one of four judges who agreed the 'fangability' of the sandwich was crucial. ''Fangability' is the tear factor, you don't want the sandwich to fall apart when you bite into it,' he said. 'I also don't want sauce running down my hands, the chefs have to balance everything just right.' Mr Woods said the annual competition puts not just the winner but all competitors 'on the map'. 'The great West Australian steak sandwich competition is alive and well in our country pubs,' he said. 'All the chefs did an amazing job and I congratulate them all.' The competition — which has been running for 18 years — was held inside the Crown Towers ballroom as part of the 2025 AHA hospitality expedition.
Epoch Times
30-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Epoch Times
Major South Korean Theater Abruptly Cancels Human Rights Film Festival Bookings
On the eve of the 5th Seoul Larkspur International Film Festival ( The abrupt decision came from MEGABOX Dongdaemun, the official screening venue of SLIFF, one day before the festival's opening on May 30, affecting multiple films documenting the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP's) human rights abuses. Organizers said they were shocked, and filmmakers said they were outraged. 'This is the first time I've seen something like this happen in Korea,' said Heo Eun-doh, SLIFF's general director and chief curator. 'A theater unilaterally canceling international human rights films—there's no question this was due to external pressure.' MEGABOX is one of Korea's largest theater chains, with more than 100 locations nationwide. According to the SLIFF organizers, they had provided all the materials to the Dongdaemun branch, had signed a contract, and had paid the full rental fee upon the approval that had been stamped by MEGABOX headquarters. Heo told The Epoch Times that his team had been monitoring ticket sales and had found that everything suddenly vanished. 'When we called, they told us, 'We don't support festivals with political nature,'' he said. Related Stories 5/30/2025 5/30/2025 Ticket sales for the festival began just the night before, on May 28, and some showings—including the May 31 screening of ' 'State Organs,' a 76-minute documentary produced by Peabody Award-winner Raymond Zhang, follows the perilous search of two families for their missing loved ones in China, according to the film's synopsis, revealing evidence of state-sanctioned forced organ harvesting, a practice unique to China that involves the killing of the organ donor. Zhang spent Zhang refuted the political allegations by the Megabox theater. 'This is not a political film—it addresses universal values such as humanity and human rights,' he said. 'I believe the sudden cancellation in Korea was driven by interference from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). When the film was screened in Taiwan, I received over a hundred threatening emails and messages and was targeted by pro-CCP cyberattacks. I didn't expect similar tactics to appear in South Korea.' Threats of mass shootings, bomb detonations, and systematic hacking were Other films affected by the last-minute cancellation include ' Despite the setback, Zhang emphasized his belief in South Korean society. 'I still believe Korea is a free and democratic country, and its citizens won't be swayed by this kind of pressure,' he said. 'Violation of Artistic and Expressive Freedom' SLIFF is the only film festival in South Korea dedicated to global human rights issues, according to Heo. He said that he and his team had spent a whole year preparing for the film festival, and described the last-minute cancellation as a devastating blow to the festival and a serious violation of free expression, attributing the cancellation to outside political pressure. 'This was not an internal decision. This was a forced shutdown—clearly influenced by external forces. It's a serious violation of artistic and expressive freedom,' Heo said. He said that what is happening now in South Korea is similar to what happened in Hong Kong in 2019, as depicted in 'Revolution of Our Times.' He said this documentary on Hong Kong's democracy movement serves as an example of why these films matter. 'No one has the right to strip away artistic or expressive freedom. And I believe the Korean public understands that. Think about it—a theater unilaterally labeling international human rights films as 'political' and pulling them while tickets are still on sale? There's no way this came from Koreans themselves,' he said. Heo pledged to keep fighting. 'We will not be silenced. We will not back down. We will stand firm, and in the end, we believe justice will prevail,' he said. 'If we remain silent in the face of this kind of censorship, we're not just giving up on art—we're giving up on democracy itself. This cannot be brushed aside. We will make sure the truth is known throughout South Korea and call on people to stand with us. That is our unwavering position.' The film festival organizers have managed to screen 'State Organs' for one listing in KBS Hall, Seoul, on May 30. The documentary has screened in the United States, Japan, and Taiwan, and is The Epoch Times reached out to the Megabox Dongdaemun branch, but the call was not answered. An Jing contributed to this report.
