Hollywood fights back to reclaim Korean box offices
By Chung Ah-young
“Iron Man 3,” the latest in the superhero trilogy starring Robert Downey Jr. Korea Times
A boom in Korean cinema from three mega-hit films — Thieves, Masquerade (Gwanghae: The Man Who Became The King) and Miracle in Cell No.7 — saw more than 10 million tickets sold over a sevenmonth span. However, this has apparently come to a halt due to the dominance of Hollywood blockbusters.
According to the Korean Film Council (KOFIC), there has been no hit Korean film drawing more than 2 million moviegoers since New World, a star-studded noir flick of Choi Min-shik, Hwang Jung-min and Lee Jung-jae, released on Feb. 21 and which garnered 4.68 million moviegoers.
The share of Korean films in the domestic market plummeted to its lowest level in almost one-and-a-half years in April.
Recent data show that Korean films attracted some 4.5 million moviegoers last month, representing 39.8 percent of the 11.2 million total moviegoers. The figure is a sharp decline from the 63.2 percent in the previous month. Meanwhile the market share of Hollywood films rose from 23.5 percent to 55.4 percent last month.
The record is alarming given that the market share of Korean films hovered around 60 to 70 percent last year and peaked at 82.9 percent in February this year.
Iron Man 3, the latest in the superhero trilogy starring Robert Downey Jr., which was released on April 25, has contributed to lifting up the market share of Hollywood films. The movie topped the April box-office, garnering 26.368 billion won ($23.9 million) in ticket sales.
Korean director Kang Woo-suks new film Fist of Legend managed to rank second with 11.678 billion won, closely followed by Oblivion, a sci-fi adventure starring Tom Cruise, at 10.66 billion won and Running Man, a Korean film starring Shin Ha-kyun, with 9.8 billion won. G.I. Joe 2: Retaliation, the Hollywood action film directed by Jon M. Chu, came in fifth with 7.7 billion won.
Although March and April are regarded as a down time for the movie industry, Korean big-budget movies produced by large conglomerate investors and distributors such as CJ Entertainment, Lotte Entertainment and Show Box Mediaplex have struggled to draw audiences.
CJ Entertainments recent productions such as Psychometry starring Kim Kang-woo in March drew only 534,000 moviegoers while Fist of Legend starring Hwang Jung-min ended up with 1.65 million people.
Lotte Entertainments An Ethics Lesson attracted 225,618 people while Very Ordinary Couple starring Kim Min-hee received rave reviews from critics but garnered some 1.86 million people.
Show Box Mediaplexs The Gangster Shaman appeared to score a success early this year but failed to attract the anticipated 4 million moviegoers. Also the result of Paparotti which was released in March was unsatisfactory with 1.71 million moviegoers.
Worse, Running Man, a much-anticipated film fully funded by a major Hollywood studio, Fox International Productions — part of 20th Century Fox — and starring Shin Ha-kyun and Lee Min-ho, has just 1.4 million moviegoers, far short of meeting the break-even point.
The Korean films boom began faltering after Hollywood blockbuster Oblivion dominated the local box office for more than two weeks followed by Iron Man 3.
Other Hollywood films such as After Earth starring Will Smith and his son Jaden Smith and Man of Steel, a superhero series, are to be shown soon, casting a darker cloud over the Korean films.
A slew of Korean films have delayed release dates to the latter half of the year.
The Huntresses starring Ha Ji-won was originally scheduled to be shown in June but this has been postponed until the second half of the year. Alumni starring Choi Seung-hyun (K-pop group Big Bangs T.O.P.) and Secretly Greatly starring heartthrob Kim Su-hyun havent scheduled release dates yet.
Critics predict that the lull will last until Korean blockbusters Snow Piercer directed by Bong Joon-ho and Mr. Go by Kim Yong-hwa, open in July and August.