'F9' tops local box office, exceeds 1 million in ticket sales

Vin Diesel, right, and Tyrese Gibson, left, in a scene from “F9” / Courtesy of Universal Pictures

By Kwak Yeon-soo

“F9,” the latest installment in the “Fast and Furious” series, has accumulated over 1 million ticket sales in five days, local box office statistics showed Monday.

The action blockbuster sold 628,000 tickets over the weekend, bringing its combined total to 1.13 million, according to data from the Korean Film Council.

It is the first time in 10 months that a film has sold more than 1 million tickets in its first week in the box office. Since the pandemic started early last year, only two homegrown films ― “Deliver Us From Evil” and “Peninsula” ― have achieved that feat.

The film had a strong opening on Wednesday, which was the Buddha's Birthday holiday in Korea, scoring the highest opening record for a film since the start of the pandemic. It sold over 400,000 tickets, grossing 3.85 billion won ($3.4 million), on that day.

Directed by Justin Lin, “F9” follows retired street racer Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his crew as they try to stop his evil younger brother Jakob (John Cena) from obtaining a device that could be used to take control of the world.

The star-studded cast includes Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, Nathalie Emmanuel, Sung Kang, Michael Rooker, Helen Mirren, Kurt Russel and Charlize Theron.

Second place went to the Japanese animated film, “Stand By Me Doraemon 2,” with about 27,000 tickets sold over the Friday-Sunday period. It was followed by “Demon Slayer” with 19,000.