By Baek Byung-yeul
The Daejong (grand bell) Film Awards, Korea’s most revered movie industry awards, is the focus of controversy after a “no show, no award” policy was decreed for the prize-giving ceremony.
“Beginning this year, we won’t award a prize to recipients who don’t take part in the award ceremony,” an official of Korea’s largest film awards committee said during a press conference, Wednesday.
“As a festivity of the whole nation, it is undesirable to make someone accept the award on someone else’s behalf. If the prize winner is not present, the award will go to another person,” the official added.
The committee said the decision was taken to strengthen fairness, but critics have questioned the committee’s criteria for selecting award winners. They queried whether a person’s appearance at the ceremony should have anything to do with improving the fairness of the awards.
“The awards committee’s announcement sounds nonsensical as they are overlooking the core problem. To raise its authority, they are required to present the awards to the right person no matter if the prize winner is present or not,” culture critic Bae Kook-nam told The Korea Times, Thursday.
“Just as actors feel highly honored just to be nominated for the Academy Awards, the Daejong awards also need to determine who is to receive its awards impartially,” he said, citing that the 49th awards bestowed 15 out of a total of 23 awards to “Masquerade.”
Bae also pointed out that the awards need to have qualified sponsorship to make the awards to make them more esteemed.
“As many know, the Daejong awards were also bashed hard over their fairness last March when the former committee chief and llgwang Group Chairman Lee Kyu-tae were arrested for alleged corruption in state arms purchases. This shouldn’t be repeated,” he said.
The Daejong Film Awards started under the name of “Kuksan” (Korean-made) Film Awards when it was established by the culture ministry in 1958. Renamed “Daejong” in 1961, the awards held their inaugural award ceremony the following year.
The 52nd Daejong Film Awards will be held on Nov. 20 in Seoul with 27 categories. The awards committee appointed actor Choi Min-sik and actress Son Ye-jin as honorary ambassadors.