South Korean filmmaker Syeyoung Park’s dystopian feature The Fin bowed this week in Locarno’s Filmmakers of the Present competition, arriving with international sales handled by Paris- and Berlin-based outfit Coproduction Office, which has already closed an initial wave of deals ahead of the premiere. Festival materials position Park’s second feature as a key title in a lineup aimed at emerging voices.
Set in a post-war Korea ravaged by ecological collapse, the film follows Sujin, a junior bureaucrat tasked with overseeing “Omegas,” mutated outcasts exploited as cheap labor. Park frames the world through a tactile, murky aesthetic developed during a lengthy post-production, describing his aim as to “pollute the screen with colorful textures” and to let the film’s limitations show on screen.
In a director’s statement released with a first-look, Park links the story to a speculative reunified peninsula, invoking “lost dreams of those who perished at sea” as part of the film’s haunting backdrop. The Fin screens in competition from August 6–16 and expands the director’s interest in derelict urban spaces and slow-burn genre hybrids introduced in his debut, The Fifth Thoracic Vertebra.
The Fin is credited as a multinational production, reflecting the festival’s increasingly international pipeline for rising filmmakers. Park has discussed building the film’s atmosphere through extended collaboration with color and sound teams over several years, an approach that dovetails with Locarno’s focus on formally adventurous work in the section dedicated to first and second features.
Sales momentum ahead of Locarno underscores continued demand for distinctive genre cinema from Korea, with Coproduction Office using the festival platform to launch the title to buyers worldwide. Early commitments in multiple territories were secured before the world premiere, with additional discussions ongoing during the market.
