One film, four major festivals, two release dates—and one Oscar label that is easy to overstate.
On September 2, Netflix announced that Lee Chang-dong’s Possible Love will screen at the 31st Busan International Film Festival, adding a Korean homecoming to a run that already includes Venice, Toronto and New York. Days earlier, the Korean Film Council selected it as South Korea’s submission for the 99th Academy Awards.
That is a formidable itinerary. It is not, however, an Oscar nomination. Here is the useful version of the story: what has been confirmed, who is in the film and when viewers can actually watch it.
Busan Is the Newest Stop, Not the Starting Line
The latest announcement places Possible Love in BIFF’s Icons section, a program for established filmmakers with distinctive bodies of work. BIFF runs from October 6 through 15, and Netflix says five of its titles will appear across the festival’s sections.
For this film, Busan arrives after an unusually international launch. The Venice International Film Festival lists the 164-minute drama in its main competition, with public screenings on September 6 and 7. Netflix has also confirmed selections at the Toronto and New York film festivals.
That path matters because Possible Love is a Korean-language film rooted in Korean labor and family life, yet its first conversation is unfolding across several global film capitals. Busan gives the film a major festival platform at home before its wider streaming release.
Four Actors, Two Couples, One Uncomfortable Encounter
Jeon Do-yeon, Sul Kyung-gu, Zo In-sung and Cho Yeo-jeong lead the cast. The official synopsis pairs them as two married couples: a laid-off worker and his wife, and a documentary filmmaker and her husband. Their lives intersect when they meet to make a documentary, exposing different circumstances and hidden desires.
That setup sounds intimate, but Lee’s own Venice statement connects it to a larger social wound. He says a mass layoff and a violent crackdown on a strike pushed him to consider the forces that shape people’s lives—and whether freedom and love remain possible inside them.
In other words, the title is not promising a soft romantic escape. The film appears to use marriage and attraction as a close-up lens on work, class and personal agency.
Why “First Film in Eight Years” Is More Than a Tagline
Lee Chang-dong’s last feature was Burning in 2018. Calling Possible Love his first film in eight years is therefore literal, but it also explains the level of attention around the project.
The new film reconnects him with two important performers from his earlier work. Sul Kyung-gu led Peppermint Candy and Oasis, while Jeon Do-yeon starred in Secret Sunshine. Zo In-sung and Cho Yeo-jeong enter Lee’s feature-film world for the first time in this cast configuration.
For international viewers, those credits may look like a prestigious roll call. For Korean cinema, they also carry history: actors associated with Lee’s most closely studied films are meeting two stars with major commercial and global profiles. The casting makes the film feel both like a return and a new arrangement.
Korea’s Oscar Pick Is Not an Oscar Nominee—Yet
KOFIC selected Possible Love from South Korea’s contenders for the Best International Feature Film category at the 99th Academy Awards. The council says a 15-member committee praised the film’s completeness, message, visual design and layered characters.
Here is where headline language often runs too fast. Every country may submit one film to the category. That national selection enters the Academy’s process; it does not automatically become one of the final nominated films.
KOFIC says the shortlist outcome is expected by the end of 2026, ahead of the ceremony in March 2027. Until then, “South Korea’s official submission” is the accurate description.
There is a meaningful precedent behind the optimism. KOFIC notes that Lee’s Burning was the first Korean film to reach the category’s shortlist. That history strengthens the awards-season narrative, but it does not guarantee the same result.
The Viewing Plan Has Two Different Doors
Korean audiences get the first general-access opportunity. Netflix’s official release notice sets a September 23 theatrical opening in South Korea, following the early festival screenings.
The global door opens on November 6, when the film is scheduled to arrive on Netflix. That split rollout is useful to keep straight: a festival selection does not mean the public can immediately stream the film, and the Korean theatrical date is not the worldwide Netflix date.
Individual BIFF screening times and ticket details should be checked on the festival’s official schedule once they are finalized. Festival plans can change, so the event calendar—not an old repost—is the place to confirm a specific screening.
What to Watch as the Festival Run Unfolds
The immediate attention will center on Venice, where Possible Love competes before its Korean theatrical opening. Reviews will offer the first substantial public picture of how Lee balances the couples’ private tensions with the labor conflict behind the story.
After that, Busan changes the audience and the context. The film returns to Korea as both a major new work by a Korean auteur and the country’s chosen Oscar submission. That combination will invite a different conversation: not only “Is it good?” but also “What does this film say about contemporary Korean life—and how will that travel?”
The awards result remains unwritten. The release dates do not. For viewers who want to follow the film without getting ahead of the facts, September 23 in Korean theaters and November 6 on Netflix are the two dates to keep.
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