The line between erotic art and simple pornography has often troubled programmers of film festivals. But for the selectors at this week's Puchon International Festival of Fantastic Film (PiFan) (July 11-20) the idea was to pretend that they were having a serious discussion about censorship while in fact showing a collection of eight porno shorts from the 1920s - 1960s.

Without that cloak of intellectual debate there was a serious risk that festival head Kim Hong Joon or programmers Ellen Kim and Cassie Yoo would have been arrested. Pornography remains illegal in South Korea even in the context of a film festival.

After the 50 minutes of full on, but often rather funny, films the 'Blue Movie Bacchanalia: Censorship And Cinema' event duly got down to the hardcore of discussion. The debate was led by Johannes Schoenherr, a German collector who curated the event, and Joo Yoo-Shin, programmer of the Women Film Festival in Seoul.

Adding some spice to the event, as if it really needed it, the silent films were accompanied by a live techno music soundtrack, performed by the acclaimed DJ Dalpalan. The whole thing played to a packed audience of several hundred who where enthusiastic and noisy.

That could have been down to the entertainment value of the films or, as Joo pointed out, down to pornography's longstanding ability worldwide to criticise political and religious authority.

But, given the recent history of the film industry in Korea and its ability to court moral outrage - films like Jang Sun-wook's Lies and The Red Scarf, a collection of celebrities caught on tape having sex sparked huge debate and legislation - it was all the more surprising that PiFan's bluff worked.