A Good Enough Year, but the Best Year for Korean Films

Box Office Report of 2016 After five years of consecutive growth, the Korean film industry remained healthy in 2016, though the half-decade streak of gains came to an end as the industry essentially remained flat. Admissions reached 217.02 million, which was d...

Review of the first three quarters for 2016

After a few years of major growth at the beginning of the decade, the Korean box office has remained flat once again, with this year’s total to date staying at the same level as 2015. However, where gains have been made is in the local industry, which has chur...

TUNNEL Scores 4th First Place Finish

Hollywood Claims Edge in Slow Weekend After six weeks of local dominance during Korea’s biggest moviegoing season, local films lost the majority market share for the first time as business cooled off significantly, yet with the Chuseok(Korean Thanksgiving Day...

TUNNEL Threepeats at Korean Box Office

LIGHTS OUT Opens in 2nd Following the end of the lengthy Korean wave, audiences began to shrink at the Korean box office, down to 2.23 million admissions as Korean film maintained a modest edge of the market share at 54%. Maintaining its top spot for the thi...

STAR TREK Can’t Escape TUNNEL

Business remained brisk during the heat wave but with school back in session and the high summer season coming to an end ticket sales have begun to slow down at the Korean box office. Local hits remained the top draw, accounting for 71% of the weekend’s 3.04 m... Staying at number one after its major debut was disaster drama Tunnel, which slid 39% for another 1.12 million viewers (USD 8.37 million), bringing its total 5.09 million viewers (USD 36.73 million). Though the film has been well-received and should continue to post strong numbers, it is unlikely to challenge TRAIN TO BUSAN as the hit of the season.

TUNNEL Turns Competition to Rubble

RUN-OFF Fails to Take Off With record temperatures still beating down on the peninsula, attendance remained high at the Korean box office during the Independence Day weekend. Local films were the overwhelming favorite, accounting for 85% of the frame’s 4.59 m...

THE LAST PRINCESS Beats SUICIDE SQUAD

OPERATION CHROMITE Drops to 2nd It was a busy weekend at the Korean box office with four new releases battling with popular holdovers as the summer box office roars on. Despite the presence of a major new Hollywood title which is breaking records stateside, i...

OPERATION CHROMITE and TRAIN TO BUSAN Battle for Supremacy

JASON BOURNE Opens Third The biggest weekend of the year to date at the Korean box office featured two local hits vying for supremacy while a major Hollywood franchise opened well but in a distant third place. The high summer season gave local films the edge, ...

TRAIN TO BUSAN Crashes into Record Books

5.3 Million Viewers after Opening Weekend Following its bow at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, YEON Sang-ho’s live action feature debut TRAIN TO BUSAN smashed into the Korean box office, laying waste to the opening day record, when it sold 872,232...