NOTES ON ENTERTAINMENT, CULTURE AND MORE FROM KOREA (OR WHEREVER)

Monday, December 17, 2007

Korea Weekend Box Office - Dec. 14-16

Some strange goings-on with the top-10 this week. When KOBIS published the weekend numbers on Monday morning, they were obviously really low. I AM LEGEND, for example, was listed as doing about half of what its true business was. Turns out that there were some computer problems and a bunch of theaters had not reported their weekend business.

Apparently the Monday KOBIS numbers are always preliminary, and final figures are not confirmed until Tuesday. I did not know that. I hope I have not posted any wrong box office figures here in past weeks.

Anyhow, big weekend for Will Smith's I AM LEGEND. Kind of funny, considering how no one I know who saw the film liked it. Score one for Warner Bros' marketing team. LEGEND had $6.5 million, including its early Wednesday opening (true weekend numbers were closer to $5 million).

I was surprised LEGEND outperformed both SEX IS ZERO 2 and THE FIGHT. Was sure at least one of those would be a breakout hit. As it turns out, SEX IS ZERO 2 was the big Korean film over the weekend... a fact I find endlessly distressing. No, I have not seen it yet, but the original SEX IS ZERO was such a miserable film, I am disappointed people went back for more punishment.

THE FIGHT opened only in fourth, which had to have been disappointing to its distributor. It felt like I have seen ads for this film every five minutes on TV here. (SEX IS ZERO 2, on the other hand, was pretty much invisible, at least on the channels I watch).

Kind of cool to see KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE in the top ten, especially since that movie was released a few weeks ago. Are all of Hayao Miyazaki's old films going to be periodically rereleased in Korean theaters, like Disney's film used to be when I was growing up? It would be cool is young people had the opportunity to see his films in the theater.

This WeekTitle............................................Release DateScreens NationwideWeekend AttendanceTotal Attendance
1.I Am Legend12.12486678,619918,396
2.Sex Is Zero 2 (Saekjeuk Sigong Sijeun 2 - Korean)12.12440439,031584,284
3.August Rush 11.29314239,6451,336,512
4.The Fight (Ssaum - Korean) 12.13396164,750236,328
5. Seven Days (Korean)11.1424397,6291,932,717
6.Lust, Caution 11.0820069,4671,821,731
7.Hairspray
12.0621556,117294,936
8. Le Grand Chef (Sikkaek - Korean)11.0111525,0572,969,549
9. Kiki's Delivery Service11.22387,50023,716
10. My Eleventh Mother (Yeolhanbeonjjae Eomma - Korean)11.29466,275333,337
(Source: KOBIS - Figures represent 97% of nationwide box office)

2 comments:

Mike said...

Dear Mark.

thank you once again for a great look at the Korean Box office.

I have a question for you, Have you heard of a Korean film about the No-Gun-Ri bridge incident called "Small Pond" will it be released in 2008, it was scheduled to be released in June 2007 but as of yet I can not find any information about a release date.

Mark Russell said...

The most high profile film about No Gun Ri was called, last I checked, THE BRIDGE AT NO GUN RI. But maybe I missed the name change, or something like that.

Anyhow, NO GUN RI was pushed back from summer to October, but obviously it missed that deadline. And with MK Pictures in a weird place (finacially and organizationally) at the moment, I am not sure of its status.