SEOUL, Homegrown films were the main driver of last month’s box office rally in South Korea, data showed Wednesday.
According to the Korean Film Council’s monthly report on the local film industry, Korean flicks accounted for 57.5 percent of the total box office sales of last month with 95.2 billion won (US$73 million).
Local films also represented 60.4 percent of the movie tickets sold in the month, up about 7 percentage points from 53.1 percent in May.
The Korean action comedy “The Roundup” topped the monthly box office for the second consecutive time, securing more than 53.7 billion won in ticket sales.
Released in May, the sequel to the 2017 hit “The Outlaws” became the first film to top 10 million admissions since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The sequel had drawn about 12.6 million moviegoers as of Wednesday.
Two other homegrown films in the top five places are Korean superhero actioner “The Witch: Part 2” and “Broker,” the first Korean-language film project by Japanese auteur Hirokazu Kore-eda. “The Witch: Part 2” came in third with 25 billion won, while “Broker” ranked fifth with 12.3 billion won.
The second and fourth places were taken by the American sci-fi action film “Jurassic World Dominion” and “Top Gun: Maverick” starring Tom Cruise with 29.1 billion won and 23.2 billion won, respectively.
Among indie and art house films, “The Red Herring,” a Korean documentary about the embattled ex-Justice Minister Cho Kuk, topped the chart by collecting more than 1.24 billion won in ticket sales from 137,000 moviegoers.
It was followed by “After Yang,” an American sci-fi drama written and directed by Kogonada, and “Cassiopeia,” a Korean drama starring Ahn Sung-ki and Seo Hyeon-jin.
Source: Yonhap News Agency