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[HanCinema's Box Office Review] 2013.08.23 - 2013.08.25

Last weekend the Korean box office was split between local summer hits and foreign animations, with Huh Jung's thriller "Hide and Seek" coming away as the most popular feature. Huh's disturbing domestic thriller once again walked away with the lion's share of admissions, claiming just over a million (33.6%) over 659 screenings around the country. It has been a truly fantastic response by the Korean public to this young director's debut feature, attention that currently makes "Hide and Seek" the eight highest grossing Korean film of the year.

Huh and the other local flicks did not have it all their own way however, the French-American film "Now You See Me" snatched 28,3% of the ticket sales (917,545 admissions) to sit in second. Louis Leterrier's caper/thriller was produced on a budget of $75M, but already this international feature has banked $292M globally, and was given the most amounts of screens (691) in anticipation. The film has proven so popular that a sequel has already been officially confirmed. At number three was Kim Seong-su's third major feature "The Flu" with 430,603 (13%). The competition for tickets is high during this time of year, but Kim's disaster film has managed to accumulate a respectable 2.6M admissions since its release two weeks ago. Last week "The Flu" held second with almost a million tickets, and although the film only surrendered one podium place, its ticket tally was halved here.

A similar loss in steam hit Bong Joon-ho's post-apocalyptic thriller "Snowpiercer", a wound easily treated by the film's impressive new total of 8.1M admissions. "Snowpiercer" was released at the beginning of the month alongside "The Terror Live", and its fourth weekend out added 322,228 (10.2%) to its cause. "Snowpiercer" has now comfortably surpassed "The Berlin File" as the second highest grossing Korean film of the year, with only "Miracle in Cell No.7" and its mammoth 12.8M admissions ahead of it. "The Terror Live" claimed 173,845 (5.4%), advancing its efforts in Korea to almost 5.5M, setting itself up to overtake "Cold Eyes" (5.5M) in the coming week.

The bottom half of the chart was once again a foreign affair, which started with the 3D animation adventure film "Epic" on 84,711 admissions. Last week this 20th Century Fox production scored 175,514 to lead a string of foreign animations from round the world, but it was only itself and DreamWorks Animation's "Turbo" (ninth with 27,329) that made the grade this time around. The other new foreign features that cracked the top ten were the American supernatural film "R.I.P.D" (59,796), the exciting Hong Kong-Chinese martial arts piece "The Grandmaster" (38,378), and the Australian and French drama "Two Mothers" (aka "Adore"- 27,123).

 

Korean Box Office - Admissions for the Weekend 2013.08.23 - 2013.08.25 (www.kobis.or.kr)

# Films Release date Week-end Total
1 "Hide and Seek" (숨바꼭질) 2013/08/14 1 080 521 4 078 263
2 "Now You See Me"   917 545 1 068 887
3 "The Flu" (감기) 2013/08/14 430 603 2 695 054
4 "Snowpiercer" (설국열차) 2013/08/01 322 228 8 795 972
5 "The Terror Live" (더 테러 라이브) 2013/08/01 173 845 5 401 252
6 "Epic"   84 711 945 589
7 "R.I.P.D".   59 796 74 201
8 "The Grandmaster" (一代宗師)   38 378 51 288
9 "Turbo"   27 329 1 913 815
10 "Two Mothers" (Zwei Mütter)   27 123 39 901
Korean movies only  
  "Mr. Go" (미스터 고) 2013/07/17 1 277 1 326 725
  "On the Road" (길위에서) 2013/05/23 703 45 255
  "The Big Picture" (그리고 싶은 것) 2013/08/15 534 3 339
  "Fatal" (가시꽃) 2013/08/22 369 780
  "Let's Go To Rose Motel" (가자! 장미여관으로) 2013/08/14 200 8 127
  "Private Island" (일탈여행 프라이빗 아일랜드) 2013/08/29 200 200
  "Mr. Park" (1960, 박서방) - Re-release   159 2 419
  "The Bluff" (허풍) 2013/08/14 105 471
  "There Is No Beautiful Farewell" (아름다운 이별은 없다) 2013/08/22 100 200
  "Let Me Out" (렛 미 아웃) 2013/08/15 94 667

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