Actor-turned-director Cho Jin-woong’s short film “Ryuk-sa: A Teaser” has been invited to two film festivals in North America, the Fantasia Film Festival and New York Asian Film Festival, according to his agency Saram Entertainment.

The Fantasia Film Festival will run from Aug. 5-25 in Montreal, and the 2021 New York Asian Film Festival will take place Aug. 6-22. Both festivals will be hybrid online-offline events.

Cho’s 17-minute short film aims to deliver a message that anyone can become a hero at any time, anywhere. The movie is created as a teaser of a feature film, according to the agency.

“Ryuk-sa: A Teaser” begins with a woman waiting in a coffeehouse. Then, an amateur baseball player enters the shop and asks her to forget about him and how he saved her from the rubble of a collapsed building.
 

Fantasia Film Festival programmer Nicolas Archambault said he selected Cho’s film because although it is only a teaser, its storyline is interesting and beautifully directed.

“We are delighted to introduce the first directorial work of actor Cho Jin-woong, whom Fantasia loves,” the film’s international distributor K-Movie Entertainment said in a statement. “It would be an honor if this teaser film can lead to making an actual feature film in the future.”

Meanwhile, “The Devil’s Deal,” directed by Lee Won-tae and in which Cho stars, has also been invited to the Fantasia Film Festival. The movie is one of 14 films in the international competition category.

“The Devil’s Deal” is set in 1992 in Busan as the city is preparing for an election. Politician Jeon Hae-woong (Cho) is running his campaign with great confidence, but the situation changes after a visit from his debt collectors. To make matters worse, he also has been ousted from his party. Deeply in debt, he decides to accept a dangerous deal to win the election.