Middle schooler Hyemi (Jung Minju) longs to shine as the center of her school dance team. But when a costume mishap occurs on stage during the Jeongwol Daeboreum (Great Full Moon) festival, cracks begin to spread through Hyemi’s once self-assured world. She grows distant from her close friends, and worse still, the existence of her parents - a secret she has kept to herself, hoping the world would never find out - is now in danger of being exposed to everyone. FULL MOON captures the moment when two opposing impulses within an adolescent girl collide - the desire to turn away from and conceal her most vulnerable self, and the longing to be seen and recognized by the world - opening the first crack in her life. The taste of loss is bitter, and the confusion cruel, but this is not the end. Just as the moon wanes only to wax again, she discovers an unexpected friendship and forms a tender connection with the adult world she once thought she could never understand. Clean, unembellished cinematography and music that feels like an intimate language richly fill out the film.
Jeong Jihye was born in 1995 and is based in Busan and Gyeongsangnam-do. She studied film directing at Dongseo University and directed the short films Good Girl (2017) and Selling Blood (2018). Her debut feature, Jeong-sun (2022), was screened in the New Directors section at the San Sebastián International Film Festival and at other prominent film festivals in Korea and abroad. It won the Grand Prize in Korean Competition at the Jeonju International Film Festival, as well as the Grand Jury Prize and the Best Actress Award at the Rome Film Festival.
From Busan International Film Festival 2026, No. 31
