BUSAN?Filipino filmmaker GB Sampedro?s ?Astig? (?Squalor?) received a Special Mention citation at the 14th Pusan International Film Festival in South Korea.

The film competed with 11 others in the New Currents section.

Written by Jerry Gracio, ?Astig? was cited for ?its boldness in form and narration and for its courage to approach without concession the hard life of young Filipinos confronted to struggle to survive in an unequal society.?

?We are thrilled to have brought honor to our country from the PIFF,? said supervising producer Noel Ferrer on Friday night. ?I?m particularly happy that we were able to highlight the best of indie and mainstream cinema and got recognized for it.?

?Astig,? an episodic tale of four young men whose stories parallel and contrast with the landmarks and various images of Manila, won for Sampedro the Best Director award at the 5th Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival in July. It has been invited to the Asiatica Filmmediale in Rome, Italy, to be held next month, Ferrer reported.

?Very inventive?

?Sampedro approaches the sexual commerce as a means to survive. His images are harsh, poignant and set the relationships between money and sex and the exploitation of women. Very inventive, ?Squalor? is a politically correct film,? said the PIFF New Currents jury, chaired by French filmmaker Jean Jacques Beneix.

Twenty Filipino films were screened at the PIFF?12 in the Retrospective section, six in exhibition and two in competition. The Philippines is the festival?s ?country of honor? this year.

The awards ceremony on Friday night, held at the Pusan IFF Pavilion, began promptly at 6 p.m. (Manila time). It was attended by an estimated 10,000 people.

Best Movie Honor

The Iraqi-Kurdish drama ?Kick Off,? by Shawkat Amin Korki, shared the New Currents Award with the South Korean film ?I?m In Trouble,? by So Sang-min. The award, given to first-time and second-time film directors, also came with a cash prize of $30,000.

?Kick Off,? a story of a group people living in an illegal multi-ethnic settlement that tries to stage a friendly soccer match under obstacle-strewn conditions, also bagged the festival?s Best Movie honor in a separate award handed by the International Federation of Film Critics.

For the first time this year, the PIFF handed over a Flash Forward Award to debuting director Zaida Bergoth of Finland for the family drama ?Last Cowboy Standing.? The award also came with a $20,000 cash prize.

The Sonje Award for Short Films went to Kim Jae-won?s ?Somewhere Unreached? (Korea) and Basil Vassili Mironer?s ?Rare Fish? (Singapore, Indonesia); the PIFF Mecenat Award for Documentaries to Kwon Woo-jung?s ?Earth?s Woman? (Korea) and Saba Dewan?s ?The Other Song? (India); the NETPAC Award to Park Chan-ok?s ?Paju? (Korea); and the KNN Movie Award to Jiang Wenli?s ?Lan? (China).