Report
FROZEN Leaves JUMANJI Out in the Cold
Local Noir KILLED MY WIFE Opens in 6th place
Business was down over 30% week-on-week as new titles failed to unseat the reigning champ on the charts. The mid-December weekend still managed to draw a healthy 2.14 million viewers, a figure that should rise considerably as we enter the end-of-year season with a batch of major new releases this coming Wednesday and Thursday. Meanwhile Korean films barely registered on the charts with a minuscule 7% share.
Leading the way for the fourth straight weekend was Disney’s behemoth Frozen 2, which slowed just 35% as another 896,000 viewers (USD 6.55 million) snatched up tickets. This gave the animated hit a gargantuan 12.08 million admissions (USD 85.92 million) to date, which makes it the 4th best-selling import of all time and the 15th highest overall. Although business should finally take a hit in the coming days as it will lose a significant amount of screens, it still has room to move up several rungs on the all-time charts.
While Jumanji: The Next Level improved on its predecessor’s debut in several major markets, it was slightly behind in Korea, surely owing to the enduring success of Frozen 2. Nevertheless the action-adventure film managed to score a decent debut with 601,000 seats (USD 4.42 million) filled over the weekend and 802,000 sales (USD 5.77 million) counted since its Wednesday bow.
Solid word of mouth helped both Ford V Ferrari and Knives Out, which were down 29% and 25%, respectively, with 243,000 (USD 1.88 million) and 123,000 entries (USD 931,000) counted over their sophomore weekend. That gives the racing drama 878,000 viewers (USD 6.61 million) and the whodunnit 448,000 spectators (USD 3.21 million) after 12 days in theaters.
In fifth place was the local family drama A Little Princess as it slowed 57% with 68,000 seats filled (USD 470,000), pushing its total to 428,000 admissions (USD 2.81 million).
Meanwhile the low-budget Korean noir Killed My Wife opened in sixth place with 44,000 sales (USD 324,000) and 75,000 entries (USD 534,000) over five days.
Local films are expected to finally reclaim the chart this coming weekend with two films: opening on Wednesday is the webcomic adaptation START-UP starring Don LEE, followed on Thursday by the star-studded disaster action-drama ASHFALL, with LEE Byung-hun, HA Jung-woo and once again Don LEE.
