An Unexpected Jackpot

Box Office Report of 2017 The Korean film market reached new all-time benchmarks for income and admissions in 2017 after a strong December rally. Yet the real story behind the numbers was which unexpected films got audiences the most excited while several seem...

Stranger Than Fiction: Politics & History Inspire Cinema

The Korean box office has had a rocky ride through the first two trimesters of 2017, but this period was not without its success stories. Though controversies and an uneven slate of films presented some obstacles, Korean history remained a strong driver for pr...

THE BATTLESHIP ISLAND Drowns Out the Competition

The high summer season truly kicked off this past weekend with the release of the year’s biggest Korean film. Admissions rose 60% over last week to crack 4 million but remained behind last year’s comparable figure by about 20%. Local films took back the market...

Box office, November 22-December 5

The past two weeks have seen a comparatively balanced division of revenues at the Korean box office, with no one film dominating the market. Sitting at the top of the chart is local box office hit A Werewolf Boy, which took 1,212,471 admissions in its fourth a...

Box office, November 15-28

Box office, November 15-28 Local box office hit A Werewolf Boy continued to perform well during its third and fourth weeks on release, earning almost exactly as much as Hollywood film The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2 did in its first and second week...

Box office, November 1-14

Yet another local film has taken the box office by storm, in a year of unprecedented commercial success for Korean cinema. A Werewolf Boy featuring young stars SONG Joong-ki and PARK Bo-young has steadily gained momentum since its release on October 31, sellin...

Box office, November 2 - 15

Local hit <Punch> continued to dominate the box office in the first two weeks of November. A character-centered drama about a high school boy and his teacher who lives next door, director LEE Han’s film has been enjoying buoyant word of mouth, thanks la...