Japanese film 'There is a Stone' wins grand prize at Jeonju IFF

The 24th Jeonju International Film Festival announced its award winners on Wednesday evening during a ceremony that took place at Jeonbuk National University's Samsung Cultural Center in Jeonju, North Jeolla Province.

A total of 17 awards in four categories -- international competition, Korean competition, Korean competition for shorts and special award -- were given out.

Under the international competition category, Ota Tatsunari won the grand prize with his film, "There is a Stone." The story revolves around a travel agency employee named Yoshikawa, who visits a town in the suburbs to do research for a new tourism project, and meets Doi, who skips stones by a river.

Under the Korean competition category, Shin Dong-min's "From You," which explores the significance of family, took home the grand prize.

In the three-chapter film, the director's mother, Kim Hye-jung, stars in the film, while Shin himself also plays the role of her son in the last chapter. The film was praised for its setting in a unique genre, dismantling the boundary between documentary and narrative films.

In the Korean competition for shorts category, "Queen's Crochet," by director Cho Hanna, received the grand prize. The 36-minute documentary centers around a girl who knitted for 15 years with a crochet hook she got from her grandmother.

Under the special award category, "Stonewalling," a film by Huang Ji and Otsuka Ryuji, won the NETPAC award, which is given by the Network for the Promotion of Asian Cinema to one out of the 10 Asian films screened during the Jeonju IFF. The J Vision award went to Kim Eun-seong's "COMPUTER."

This year's 10-day Jeonju International Film Festival, which runs through Saturday, showcases 247 films from 42 nations.