Our mark is 銀幕, ginmaku — the silver screen, and the same two characters in Japanese, Chinese and Korean.

I came to Tokyo at twenty-three for a summer job at a Shibuya mini-theatre and the job never quite ended. Fifteen years of festivals later I still think the only review that counts is the one the room gives you: where the laugh lands, the moment three hundred people stop moving at once, whether anybody stays for the credits.

Cinepuuulse follows Asian cinema — Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand — across about a hundred and twenty sources. A good number of them are Spanish, French and Portuguese, because those countries programme this work seriously and write about it better than most of the English-language trade. Genre and art-house get the same seat here. I am not ranking them, and nothing is scored out of ten.

Each story is a headline, a short excerpt, one still and a link to the outlet that did the reporting. We never republish the piece, and the still belongs to its studio or its photographer. A Korean trade paper appears in Korean, a French review in French. We point at the work; we do not put words in anyone's mouth.

— Daren Wise, Tokyo

← Cinepuuulse Archive

Variety

Iranian Auteur Majid Majidi Wins Top Prize at Busan Film Festival With ‘Midday Meal’

October 15

Veteran Iranian filmmaker Majid Majidi has won Best Film at the 31st Busan International Film Festival for “Midday Meal,” his simple, starkly powerful contemporary parable about a rural schoolteacher…

Festivals & awards Directors

Read at Variety ↗

One letter a week, starting soon.

Latest

Iranian Auteur Majid Majidi Wins Top Prize at Busan Film Festival With ‘Midday Meal’

Related

‘La Bola Negra’ Directors Los Javis and Star Guitarricadelafuente to Be Awarded at Miami Film Festival Gems Variety

KoreaKorean filmmaker July Jung awarded French cultural honor Yonhap

UKWinners announced at the 2026 BFI & CHANEL Filmmaker Awards BFI / Sight and Sound

JapanDirectors O Mipo and Mohammad Rasoulof to Receive 39th TIFF Kurosawa Akira Award Tokyo International Film Festival

IrelandPodcast: Actor Keith Dunphy & Filmmaker/Festival Founder Christine Braithwaite on Dyslexia & RIFF Film Ireland

Hong KongGolden Horse Awards 2026 nominations in full: Arrested Memory and Girl lead the race SCMP Film