The theme of the KOFFLA is "It's Alive: Korean Film Genre Hybrids and Hollywood Remakes," and that will be exactly the focus for the entire festival: cross-genre films and films that might be good candidates for a Hollywood retelling.The Korean Film Festival, better known as KOFFLA, opened this afternoon in Los Angeles with a panel discussion.

Moderated by David Alpert of Circle of Confusion, the panel brought together Zak Kadison from Fox Atomic, Roy Lee of Vertigo, and Jonathan Kim of Dyne Films, to discuss the Korean film industry in relation to Hollywood. One thing Korean films offer, said the panel, is fresh ideas and new stories, which Hollywood is always open to. Zak went so far as to say that Korean cinema tells crime stories in a way that Hollywood can only aspire to.

Naturally, when the floor was opened to questions someone wanted to know why Hollywood keeps doing remakes. To this the panel pointed out that Hollywood has been using source material basically forever. However, what Hollywood really wants is a compelling story, old or new, so if you have that it doesn't matter whether you live in Seoul or South Dakota.

After the panel everyone headed over to the Korean Film Council for a reception where guests could mingle with panelists and meet Kim Tai Sik, director of the festival's opening film, Driving With My Wife's Lover. Kim, who is visiting Los Angeles for the first time, has made a film that's a huge departure from what some Americans may regard as typical Korean film fare.

Driving has an arthouse feel and is, he says, very much performance-driven, by which he means he lets the camera linger on the actors so they can fully express themselves before he moves on.

I chatted with some fellow festival-goers who said Kim Tai Sik has admitted to being a fan of Sideways, and I could see that audience loving his film. I hope they'll get a chance to see it.