South Korea

Coordinates: 36°N 128°E / 36°N 128°E / 36; 128

South Korea ( listen), officially the Republic of Korea (Hangul: 대한민국; hanja: 大韓民國; RR: Daehanminguk,  listen) and commonly referred to as Korea, is a sovereign state in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korean Peninsula. The name Korea is derived from the ancient Kingdom of Goguryeo, also known as Koryŏ. Highly urbanized at 92%, Koreans lead a distinctive urban lifestyle with half of them living in the Seoul Capital Area, the world's second largest city with over 25 million residents and a leading global city with the fourth largest economy, rated in 2016 as the world's most livable megacity and safest city to live in. Highly mountainous, Korea is a popular winter sport destination in Asia, hosting the 2018 Winter Olympics.

The earliest Korean pottery dates to 8000 BC, with three kingdoms flourishing at 1st century BC. One of them, Goguryeo, ruled Northeast China, parts of Russia and Mongolia under Gwanggaeto the Great. Since their unification into Silla and Balhae in the 7th century, Korea enjoyed over a millennium of relative tranquility under long lasting dynasties with innovations like Hangul, the unique alphabet created by Sejong the Great in 1446, enabling anyone to easily learn to read and write. Its rich and vibrant culture left 17 UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritages of Humanity, the third largest in the world, along with 12 World Heritage Sites. Korea was annexed by Imperial Japan in 1910 due to its strategic and central location, after whose surrender in 1945, it was divided into North and South Korea. A North Korean invasion lead to the Korean War (1950–53). Peace has since mostly continued with the two agreeing to work peacefully for reunification and the South solidifying peace as a regional power with the world's 10th largest defence budget and strong global alliances. In 2016, Korea was rated as the world's safest country to live in, with the lowest crime rate.

Film festival

A film festival is an organized, extended presentation of films in one or more cinemas or screening venues, usually in a single city or region. Increasingly, film festivals show some films outdoors. Films may be of recent date and, depending upon the festival's focus, can include international and domestic releases. Some festivals focus on a specific film-maker or genre (e.g., film noir) or subject matter (e.g., horror film festivals). A number of film festivals specialise in short films of a defined maximum length. Film festivals are typically annual events. Some film historians do not consider Film Festivals as official releases of film, like Jerry Beck. The best known film festivals are the Venice Film Festival, the Cannes Film Festival, the Toronto Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, and the Berlin International Film Festival, the latter being the largest film festival worldwide, based on attendance. The Venice Film Festival is the oldest major festival. The Melbourne International Film Festival is the largest film festival in the Southern Hemisphere and one of the oldest in the world. A 2013 study found 3,000 active films festivals worldwide—active defined as having held an event in the previous 24 months.

Korea

Korea, called Chosŏn (Korean: 조선; Hanja: 朝鮮) in North Korea and Hanguk (Korean: 한국; Hanja: 韓國) or Daehanminkuk (Korean: 대한민국; Hanja: 大韓民國) in South Korea, is an East Asian territory that is divided into two distinct sovereign states: North Korea, formally the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), and South Korea, formally the Republic of Korea (ROK). Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by China to the northwest and Russia to the northeast. It is separated from Japan to the east by the Korea Strait and the Sea of Japan .

Korea emerged as a singular political entity after centuries of conflict among the Three Kingdoms of Korea, which were unified as Silla (57 BC – AD 935) and Balhae (AD 698 – 926). The united Silla was eventually succeeded by Goryeo in 935 at the end of the Later Three Kingdoms period. Goryeo, which gave name to the modern exonym "Korea", was a highly cultured state and created the Jikji in the 14th century. The invasions by the Mongol Empire in the 13th century, however, greatly weakened the nation, which forced it into vassalage. After the Yuan dynasty's collapse, severe political strife followed. Goryeo eventually fell to an uprising led by General Yi Seong-gye, who established Joseon in 1388.

Festival

A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect of that community and its religion or traditions, often marked as a local or national holiday, mela or eid. Next to religion and folklore, a significant origin is agricultural. Food is such a vital resource that many festivals are associated with harvest time. Religious commemoration and thanksgiving for good harvests are blended in events that take place in autumn, such as Halloween in the northern hemisphere and Easter in the southern.

Festivals often serve to fulfill specific communal purposes, especially in regard to commemoration or thanksgiving. The celebrations offer a sense of belonging for religious, social, or geographical groups, contributing to group cohesiveness. They may also provide entertainment, which was particularly important to local communities before the advent of mass-produced entertainment. Festivals that focus on cultural or ethnic topics also seek to inform community members of their traditions; the involvement of elders sharing stories and experience provides a means for unity among families.

Audience award

An audience award is typically an award at a film festival (or some other type of cultural festival or similar competition) which is selected by the audience attending the festival, rather than by the festival jury or a group of critics.

Examples

A well-known example of audience awards are those given out at the Sundance Film Festival, which is one of the leading independent film festivals in the world. Sundance first awarded audience awards in 1989, and now has separate audience awards for dramatic, documentary, and world cinema. These awards have become among the most important awards granted at the festival. The first Sundance Audience Award winner was Steven Soderbergh's Sex, Lies, and Videotape, whose success at Sundance produced a studio bidding war, and which then became the first hit film to come out of the Sundance festival. The Audience Award came to be seen as a better indicator of potential commercial success than the juried awards.

A different example is the Independent Lens Audience Award, in which the television viewing audience is invited to rate each episode of the PBS independent film series (through online voting), and an award is given to each season's best rated episode.