Ten years after Train to Busan: Yeon Sang-ho opens Razor Reel with Colony
A train bound for Busan. A tower block in Seoul. Yeon Sang-ho knows how to turn a familiar place into a nightmare. In 2016, we closed Razor Reel with Train to Busan. Ten years later, we’re opening the 19th edition with Colony, his new genre film. We couldn’t have planned that circle more neatly.
More than a zombie director
Yeon started out in animation, with films including The King of Pigs and Seoul Station. Train to Busan brought him an international breakthrough in 2016: a fast-moving zombie film in which the passengers face not only an infection, but also one another’s choices. It screened in Cannes’ Midnight Screenings that year and closed our festival edition.
He didn’t let that success lock him into one formula. Psychokinesis (2018) gave him a superhero; Peninsula (2020) returned to the world of Train to Busan with new characters; and JUNG_E (2023) headed into science fiction. The series Hellbound and Parasyte: The Grey kept him exploring the edges of fantastic cinema. Revelations and The Ugly followed in 2025. You don’t need zombies to wonder what people will do when the world they know falls apart.
From Cannes to Bruges
Exactly ten years after Train to Busan, Colony also found a place in Cannes’ Midnight Screenings. I skipped the late-night show and saw the film the following day. After that, the choice for Razor Reel came quickly: this had to be our opening film.
In Colony, a mysterious infection spreads through a tower block in Seoul. A building has replaced the train, but the question is just as urgent: whom can you trust when escape is far from certain?
On Thursday 29 October 2026 at 8 pm, we’ll present the Belgian premiere of Colony to open the 19th Razor Reel Flanders Film Festival. Ten years ago, we ended with Yeon Sang-ho. This year, we begin with him!