Sim Su-bin Just Won Best New Performer at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards. She Only Debuted Last Year

Featured photo: Sim Su-bin at the BIFF Discoveries: Rising New Talents open talk, Busan International Film Festival, October 10, 2026. Photo: Saraa.kom / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.

On Friday night, October 30, 2026, at The Star Gold Coast in Australia, Sim Su-bin received the Best New Performer award at the 19th Asia Pacific Screen Awards for The World Before (Cheot Segye), Yoon Dan-bi’s second narrative feature. APSA gives the prize to “an exceptional debut or sophomore performance in a feature film,” and it named her the winner on October 5, ahead of the ceremony, then handed her the trophy on the Gold Coast (Asia Pacific Screen Awards, Oct. 5 and Oct. 30, 2026). Her first film came out in 2025. “The World Before is the first film I was cast in after I started acting,” she said. “It already meant so much, and this award makes that meaning shine even brighter” (JTBC, Oct. 31, 2026).

I’ll be honest: as a fan, I’ve been waiting for this one since September, and it still made me grin like a kid. Then she ended her speech with a promise to keep working “until I become a Best Old Performer” (JTBC; Electronic Times, Oct. 31, 2026), and I fell for her all over again.

The trailer TIFF released for the film’s world premiere in the Platform competition.

What happened on the Gold Coast

• The award. Best New Performer, one of three prizes APSA announced early, along with the Young Cinema Award and the Cultural Diversity Award (APSA, Oct. 5, 2026). The other big winners that night included Guria (Best Film, Levan Koguashvili) and Pushpa Thing Lama (Best Performance, Elephants in the Fog) (APSA, Oct. 30, 2026). APSA didn’t publish a shortlist for the category.
• The film. In The World Before, she plays Jin, a 17-year-old girl on a remote island who goes through everything in one summer, from her grandmother’s death to her first love (Allure Korea, Sept. 30, 2026). Kim Eo-jin co-stars.
• The thank-you. “I think I won because of Director Yoon Dan-bi’s special way of seeing,” she said. “Thanks to her warm gaze toward people, I could shine too. I want to tell her how grateful I am and how much I respect her” (JTBC).
• The company it keeps. JTBC noted that Lee Byung-hun, Choi Min-sik, Youn Yuh-jung and Lee Jung-eun have all been honored at APSA before her. That is a lineup for someone to join one year into a career.

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The World Before: the film that took her to Toronto

The World Before is Yoon Dan-bi’s follow-up to Moving On (2020), the quiet family summer film that made critics fall for her in the first place. It had its world premiere in the Platform section, the Toronto International Film Festival’s only competition, in September (The Korea Times, July 22, 2026; Segye Ilbo, July 23, 2026). Then it went to the 74th San Sebastián International Film Festival and the 31st Busan International Film Festival, where it played in Korean Cinema Today – Panorama. Next come the 75th Mannheim-Heidelberg International Film Festival in November and Tokyo FILMeX 2026 (JTBC; News1, July 31, 2026). Berlin-based m-appeal is handling international sales (Screen Daily). Its distributor, At9 Film, plans a Korean theatrical release in 2027 (The Fact, July 22, 2026; News1, Sept. 21, 2026).

After the Toronto screenings, Korean headlines called her “an exceptional talent” (News1, Sept. 21, 2026).

The international trailer from m-appeal, the film’s sales agent.

The audition story is the cutest thing I’ve read all year. Sim told Allure Korea she was so nervous she was “shaking” in front of Yoon, a director whose Moving On she adored. Yoon’s very first word was keoyeopda, internet slang for “cute.” Sim spent days trying to decode it. She thought she’d been told to relax and try again next time. Instead, she got the part. “It turns out ‘cute’ is her highest compliment,” she said (Allure Korea, Sept. 30, 2026).

She also told Allure that her own first love felt nothing like cotton candy. It was “like swallowing a burning fireball in one bite,” and that is how she wanted to play Jin. The actor who plays her grandmother isn’t a professional. Sim told Allure she felt a tender bond with her, and during cold outdoor takes she kept rubbing her back so she wouldn’t get chilly (Allure Korea).

Yoon Dan-bi’s first feature, the film Sim says she loved before she ever met the director (trailer via KoBiz, the Korean Film Council).

Filmography: one year, six titles

Year	Title	Role	What it did
2025	En Route To (Jiureo Ganeun Gil), dir. Yoo Jae-in	Lead, a pregnant teenager	Her debut. Won the New Currents Award at the 30th Busan International Film Festival (JTBC) and was invited to Berlin (EBS News, Jan. 20, 2026)
2026	Filing for Love (Eunmilhan Gamsa), tvN	Supporting	Her first TV series (Allure Korea)
2026	If Wishes Could Kill (Girigo), Netflix	Supporting	Netflix’s YA horror series, released April 24, 2026
2026	Teach You a Lesson (Chamgyoyuk), Netflix	A student caught cheating on an exam	Released June 5, 2026
2026	The World Before (Cheot Segye), dir. Yoon Dan-bi	Lead, Jin	TIFF Platform, San Sebastián, BIFF. APSA Best New Performer
2026	The Birds (Sae), dir. Sohn Hyun-lok	Hyejeong	Invited to the 31st BIFF, Vision – Korea section

(Roles and titles: JTBC; Electronic Times; Allure Korea, Sept. 30, 2026.)

Busan’s official trailer for her debut film, from the New Currents competition.

tvN’s teaser for the office rom-com, her first TV series.

Three turning points

1. The impulsive leap. She started out in fine art, she told Allure, but painting by the rules felt stifling. She nearly put acting off “for my next life,” then thought, what if there isn’t one?, and started on the spot. Her first role, in an arts high school play, was a woman who had lost her mind, and the moment the stage lights hit her, she said, she felt free. That was the day it really began (Allure Korea).
2. 2025, a debut that won Busan. En Route To, her first film, took the New Currents Award at the 30th Busan International Film Festival (JTBC). A brand-new face, carrying a lead role in Busan’s main competition: that’s how cinephiles first learned her name.
3. 2026, Netflix and Toronto in the same year. Two Netflix series, in April and June, put her in front of a global streaming audience. Then The World Before went to Toronto’s competition in September and won her the APSA prize in October. JTBC put it simply: within one year of her debut, she has become an actress the world is watching.

Netflix’s English-subtitled trailer for the YA horror series.

Netflix’s English-subtitled trailer.

Why Sim Su-bin is the real thing

She’s fearless with heavy material. Look at the roles she’s already taken: a pregnant teenager in En Route To, a girl caught cheating in Teach You a Lesson, a girl at the center of a mystery in The Birds, and Jin, grieving and in love at the same time. Allure Korea noted that she has played teenagers living through very different events and feelings. She doesn’t play it safe, and that’s exactly why festival programmers keep calling: Berlin, Busan, Toronto, San Sebastián, all in about a year.

She plays big emotions without forcing them. Electronic Times wrote that she draws out Jin’s inner life and shifts in feeling with restraint, and that her controlled performance deepens the film’s pull (Electronic Times, Oct. 31, 2026). JTBC said she renders the character’s complicated inner life delicately. That restraint is what Yoon Dan-bi films are built on, and Sim found it in her very first cast role.

She is adorably humble about all of it. She told Allure she never believes anything until she sees it with her own eyes. The magazine wouldn’t feel real, she said, until the printed copy was actually in her hands. She loves watching birds by the river on her walks, which is why she fell for the title of The Birds. After every shoot, she said, comes “a time of regret and repentance,” and she has decided to see it as showing her trial and error, because “I can just do better in the next one” (Allure Korea). An award-winning lead talking like a first-year student is the most endearing thing about her.

Busan’s official trailer for The Birds, her next film, from the Vision – Korea section.

Where to watch

• The World Before — not in theaters or on streaming yet. Upcoming festival screenings: the 75th Mannheim-Heidelberg International Film Festival in November (https://www.iffmh.de/) and Tokyo FILMeX 2026 (Japan). At9 Film plans a Korean theatrical release in 2027. (Checked Oct. 31, 2026.)
• If Wishes Could Kill — Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81975196 (global; checked Oct. 31, 2026, from Korea).
• Teach You a Lesson — Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/81947301 (global; checked Oct. 31, 2026, from Korea).
• Filing for Love — aired on tvN in Korea. In Korea, it streams on TVING: https://www.tving.com/ (checked Oct. 31, 2026; availability abroad varies by region).
• En Route To and The Birds — festival titles. No regular theatrical or streaming release confirmed as of Oct. 31, 2026.

She told Allure that if people want to get to know her, they should watch her films in order. So that’s the plan: En Route To, then The World Before, then The Birds. The Gold Coast trophy is just the start, and I can’t wait to watch her open the next one.

Sources

• Asia Pacific Screen Awards, “Asia Pacific Screen Awards Announces 2026 Winners,” Oct. 30, 2026 — https://www.asiapacificscreenawards.com/news-events/asia-pacific-screen-awards-announces-2026-winners
• Asia Pacific Screen Awards, “2026 APSA Juries and First Winners Announced Ahead of APSA Awards Ceremony,” Oct. 5, 2026 — https://www.asiapacificscreenawards.com/news-events/2026-apsa-juries-and-first-winners-announced-ahead-of-apsa-awards-ceremony
• JTBC, “‘첫세계’ 심수빈, 亞태평양스크린어워드 최우수신인상 수상,” Oct. 31, 2026 — https://news.jtbc.co.kr/article/NB12325791
• Electronic Times (etnews), “심수빈, ‘APSA’ 홀렸다…최우수신인상 수상,” Oct. 31, 2026 — https://www.etnews.com/20261031000021
• Allure Korea, “<첫세계>와 <새>로 주목받은 라이징 심수빈,” Sept. 30, 2026 — https://www.allurekorea.com/2026/09/30/첫세계와-새로-주목받은-라이징-심수빈/
• The Korea Times, “Yoon Dan-bi’s ‘The World Before’ to compete in Toronto film fest,” July 22, 2026 — https://www.koreatimes.co.kr/entertainment/films/20260722/yoon-dan-bis-the-world-before-to-compete-in-toronto-film-fest
• Screen Daily, “Korean love story ‘The World Before’ boarded by m-appeal ahead of TIFF premiere” — https://www.screendaily.com/news/korean-love-story-the-world-before-boarded-by-m-appeal-ahead-of-tiff-premiere/5219518.article
• News1, “‘첫세계’ 심수빈, 토론토 국제영화제서 호평 세례 ‘탁월한 재능’,” Sept. 21, 2026; News1, “윤단비 감독 신작 ‘첫세계’, 제74회 산세바스티안국제영화제 초청,” July 31, 2026; The Fact, July 22, 2026; Segye Ilbo, July 23, 2026 (via Naver News)
• EBS News, “첫 장편으로 세계 무대…베를린 초청 유재인 감독,” Jan. 20, 2026 — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yCROe5cZLk