Korean Box Office Report - January 20/22

Sequels. Almost universally detested when they come from Hollywood, strangely successful when it comes to Chungmuro. 가문의 위기 (Marrying The Mafia 2: Enemy in Law) was both better and more successful than the original 가문의 영광 (Marrying The Mafia); and, if its opening weekend is any indication, 투사부일체 (My Boss, My Student) could continue the tradition of sequels doing better than the original at the box office. Despite being panned by just everyone in the Korean Media, the film went on to record an amazing opening day of over 300,000 tickets, helped by CJ Entertainment wide release (95 screens in Seoul, 450 nationwide) and by the buzz generated by the film. A sequel of the 2001 comedy 두사부일체 (My Boss, My Hero), the comedy starring Jung Joon-Ho sold 327,000 tickets over four days in Seoul alone, 1,360,000 nationwide, for an overall total of nearly 1.67 Million tickets. That's the second best of all time, behind 태극기 휘날리며 (Taegukgi)'s 1.77 Million. Producers Cinema Zenith expect the film to reach the 5 Million tickets, taking advantage of the Lunar New Year Holidays, but I'd say beating the original's 3.5 Million score is a more likely result. Still, there's plenty of time to break records, and even though 사랑을 놓치다 (Lost in Love) debuts on the 26th, there's nothing else on the Korean side until February 9.

As for Lee Joon-Ik's 왕의 남자 (The King and The Clown), as we reported yesterday, the film has broken into the all time Top 10, beating 쉬리 (Shiri)'s score, it has become the 4th film to break the 5 Million and the 2nd to break the 6 Million barrier in 2005. Selling 887,000 (267,000 in Seoul) tickets nationwide over the weekend, the film is now at 6.55 Million after 4 weeks, over a Million more than 웰컴 투 동막골 (Welcome To Dongmakgol)'s score at the time (5.5 Million). Cinema Service is still showing the film at 374 screens nationwide, and given the upcoming holidays, we could see the film go past the 8 Million by the end of the month.

Does it have enough legs to beat 'Welcome To Dongmakgol' and its 8+ Million record? Absolutely. Preorder sales are still very high, and word of mouth continues to spread around the country. Whether it can reach the heights of 실미도 (Silmido) and 태극기 휘날리며 (Taegukgi), both past the 10 Million tickets, simply depends on the competition. If 'My Boss, My Student' continues to do so well, and 'Lost in Love' has a good opening, then the film might go down to No. 3 in the next two weeks, and perhaps lose some momentum. But if the comedy and the melodrama (starring Seol Kyung-Gu and Song Yoon-Ah) don't put up a fight, next week we might even see it back on top.

The biggest issue of the week though concerned the release of 홀리데이 (Holiday), Yang Yoon-Ho's latest film starring Choi Min-Soo and Lee Sung-Jae. It did have a pretty good opening, selling 68,000 tickets in Seoul on its first four days, 252,000 nationwide for a total of over 300,000 tickets, but the real fight emerged when multiplex chain CGV, controlled by CJ Entertainment (which distributes the top film, 'My Boss, My Student') pulled the film out of its 25 screens because of low sales. Lotte Entertainment, which distributes the film, did agree with CGV to pull the film if it performed poorly by January 22, but now they're saying CGV simply did it to push CJ's comedy. They said the company tried its best to force viewers to avoid the film, creating problems with pre-order sales, taking off posters and the like, and eventually pulling the film after 4 days.

This created huge chaos on the net, when several netizens complained about the issue, some siding with CGV (the film was victim of complaints regarding its themes, dealing with the real life accident of Ji Gang-Heon in the 80s), others protesting the opportunism of the multiplex chain. Of course we're only talking about 10% of the film's nationwide screens, but it's important to note what happened, and learn a lesson from it. Grabbing as many screens as possible has become the new priority in Chungmuro, where unless you have strong backing in terms of distribution or word of mouth spreading to the point you're forced to add screens (like for 'The King and The Clown'), your film is pretty much bound to flop. More than worrying about the screen quota, like Finance Minister Kwon Tae-Shin did (again protesting, as he always does when it's time to reopen FTA talks with the US), we should focus on solving this problem.

야수 (Running Wild) had a pretty disappointing week. Released over 266 nationwide screens, the film only sold 36,000 tickets in Seoul and about 100,000 nationwide over the weekend, for a total of around 900,000. Consider the big cast (Kwon Sang-Woo and Yoo Ji-Tae) and its budget (10 Billion Won), dropping so fast after two weeks on release can only be considered a disappointment. With the help of the holidays it should be able to pass the Million mark and perhaps do a little better next week, but pretty much a flop. Chungmuro should finally learn a lesson from this, as all of the blockbusters released around the end of the year -- Kwak Kyung-Taek's 태풍 (Typhoon), Yoon Jong-Chan's 쳥연 (Blue Swallow) and this one -- spent big and not a single one of them will make back their initial investment.

Most of all I'm sorry for Yoon Jong-Chan and Jang Jin-Young: their film was unanimously praised, and because of a combination of competition, protests over issues dealing with Park Kyung-Won (the protagonist of the film, accused of being Pro-Japanese by some ultra-conservatives in the Korean media) and lukewarm reaction of the public, it ended up flopping badly. But it seems producers are learning their lesson pretty fast: most of the film on release in the next 6 to 8 months tend to have mid-sized budgets and a focus on ideas over casting.

The only foreign films making any serious impact on the box office continue to be The Chronicles of Narnia, which is getting closer to the 2.5 Million mark, and could pass it during the holidays; and of course Peter Jackson's King Kong, already around the 4.2 Million tickets nationwide, and on its sixth week of release. The action comedy 싸움의 기술 (The Art of Fighting) seem to have given up the fight, as it sold 23,000 tickets in Seoul over the weekend, for a total of 1.27 Million tickets over the week. Certainly not a bad result, but I expected its momentum to last a little longer. Next week will see the release of Chen Kaige's 無極 (The Promise), which could have a big impact on the box office, as it stars Jang Dong-Gun, but of course they'll also have to deal with 사랑을 놓치다 (Lost in Love), which received decent reviews, and has the Seol Kyung-Gu card to play. Also on release Me and You and Everyone We Know and Chicken Little.

Box Office Top 10 - Weekend of January 20/22

1.
투사부일체 (My Boss, My Student)
2006 KOREA - dir. Kim Dong-Won [Cast: Jung Joon-Ho, Kim Sang-Joong]
Distributed By CJ Entertainment - 39.9% (New) Share - 3,442 Per Screen Avg. - 450 Screens (New)
1,667,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

2.
왕의 남자 (The King and The Clown)
2005 KOREA - dir. Lee Joon-Ik [Cast: Gam Woo-Sung, Jung Jin-Young]
Distributed By Cinema Service - 32.6% (-8.4%) Share - 3,145 Per Screen Avg. - 374 Screens (-15)
6,550,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

3.
홀리데이 (Holiday)
2006 KOREA - dir. Yang Yoon-Ho [Cast: Choi Min-Soo, Lee Sung-Jae]
Distributed By Lotte Entertainment - 8.3% (New) Share - 1,619 Per Screen Avg. - 220 Screens (New)
307,027 Tickets Sold Nationwide

4.

야수 (Running Wild)
2006 KOREA - dir. Kim Sung-Soo [Cast: Kwon Sang-Woo, Yoo Ji-Tae]
Distributed By Showbox - 4.4% (-16.4%) Share - 681 Per Screen Avg. - 266 Screens (-123)
909,628 Tickets Sold Nationwide

5.
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe
2005 USA - dir. Andrew Adamson [Cast: Tilda Swinton, Jim Broadbent]
Distributed By Disney - 4.2% (-6.5%) Share - 829 Per Screen Avg. - 170 Screens (-62)
2,400,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

6.
King Kong
2005 NZ/USA - dir. Peter Jackson [Cast: Jack Black, Naomi Watts]
Distributed By UIP - 3.4% (-5.5%) Share - 717 Per Screen Avg. - 155 Screens (-55)
4,180,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

7.
싸움의 기술 (The Art of Fighting)
2006 KOREA - dir. Shin Han-Sol [Cast: Baek Yoon-Shik, Jae Hee]
Distributed By CJ Entertainment - 2.8% (-8%) Share - 592 Per Screen Avg. - 163 Screens (-97)
1,273,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

8.
Two Brothers
2004 FRANCE/UK - dir. Jean-Jacques Annaud [Cast: Guy Pearce, Jean-Claude Dreyfus]
Distributed By CJ Entertainment - 2.7% (New) Share - 896 Per Screen Avg. - 102 Screens (New)
78,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

9.
The Polar Express
2004 USA - dir. Robert Zemeckis [Cast: Tom Hanks, Leslie Zemeckis]
Distributed By Warner Brothers Korea - 0.8% (New) Share - 7,000 Per Screen Avg. (IMAX) - 2 Screens (New)
11,700 Tickets Sold Nationwide

10.
작업의 정석 (The Art of Seduction)
2005 KOREA - dir. Oh Gi-Hwan [Cast: Son Ye-Jin, Song Il-Guk]
Distributed By Showbox - 0.4% (-3.1%) Share - 1,193 Per Screen Avg. - 14 Screens (-114)
2,300,000 Tickets Sold Nationwide

2006 Box Office Top 5 (Korean Films)

01. 투사부일체 (My Boss, My Student) - 1,667,000
02. 싸움의 기술 (The Art of Fighting) - 1,273,000
03. 야수 (Running Wild) - 909,628
04. 홀리데이 (Holiday) - 307,027
05. 다섯개의 시선 (If You Were Me 2) - 4,500

2005 Box Office Top 10 (Korean Films)

01. 웰컴 투 동막골 (Welcome To Dongmakgol) - 8,002,594
02. 왕의 남자 (The King and The Clown) - 6,550,000
03. 가문의 위기 (Marrying The Mafia 2) - 5,663,000
04. 말아톤 (Marathon) - 5,179,154
05. 태풍 (Typhoon) - 4,180,000
06. 공공의 적 2 (Another Public Enemy) - 3,910,000
07. 친절한 금자씨 (Sympathy For Lady Vengeance) - 3,560,000
08. 너는 내 운명 (You Are My Sunshine) - 3,070,000
09. 마파도 (Mapado) - 3,020,000
10. 내 생애 가장 아름다운 일주일 (All For Love) - 2,545,000

All Time Box Office Top 10 (Korean Films)

01. 태극기 휘날리며 (Taegukgi) - 11,746,135 [2004]
02. 실미도 (Silmido) - 11,074,000 [2003]
03. 친구 (Friend) - 8,180,000 [2001]
04. 웰컴 투 동막골 (Welcome To Dongmakgol) - 8,002,594 [2005]
05. 왕의 남자 (The King and The Clown) - 6,550,000 [2005]
06. 쉬리 (Shiri) - 6,210,000 [1999]
07. 공동경비구역 JSA (Joint Security Area) - 5,830,000 [2000]
08. 가문의 위기 (Marrying The Mafia 2) - 5,663,000 [2005]
09. 조폭 마누라 (My Wife is a Gangster) - 5,250,000 [2001]
10. 가문의 영광 (Marrying the Mafia) - 5,200,001 [2002]

[Sources: Film2.0 1, Film2.0 2, nKino 1, nKino 2, Star News 1, Star News 2, Yonhap News, Yahoo Korea]