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| A scene from the film, "The First Slam Dunk"/ Courtesy of SMF Holdings |
By Kwak Yeon-soo
While "Avatar: The Way of Water" has been topping the box office for a month, two animated films, one from Japan and the other from the U.S., are enjoying a surge in popularity at the box office since their launch at local cinemas a week ago.
"The First Slam Dunk," based on Takehiko Inoue's basketball-themed manga series, "Slam Dunk," ranked second with 460,000 moviegoers since Jan. 4, and DreamWorks' "Puss in Boots" sequel was ranked fourth with 330,000 people buying tickets to see the animated adventure. The top spot has been retained by "Avatar 2" with a total audience of 8.8 million since its Korean release on Dec. 14.
"Slam Dunk" follows Ryota Miyagi, a high school student who plays point guard in his school's basketball team and his journey to become the champion of a nationwide tournament.
According to data by CGV and Naver Movie, more than 60 percent of viewers were people in their 30s and 40s, who grew up reading the original comic book when they were in middle or high school.
A special edition of the original comic, "Slam Dunk Champ," issued in conjunction with the film's release, also saw a major surge in sales. The book topped the bestseller chart in the first week of January, according to online book retailer Yes 24.
"Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" is also gaining popularity, especially from family viewers with young children during the winter vacation season.
Directed by Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, the sequel to "Puss in Boots" (2011) follows Puss on his epic adventure to find the mythical wishing star and restore his nine lives. The "Shrek" spinoff has attracted built-in audiences who loved the animated series. "The film is a comfort movie that is extremely funny," one viewer wrote.
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| A scene from the film, "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" / Courtesy of Universal Pictures |
Other animated films have also gained good box office scores in recent years.
The phenomenon is epitomized by the success of "Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba The Movie ― Mugen Train," which, despite opening in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, exceeded 2.18 million in ticket sales here. It ranked 7th overall at the box office in 2021. Disney's "Soul" also attracted more than 2 million moviegoers, becoming the ninth most-watched film of that year.
"The success of animated films appealed to audiences of all ages and brought them back to theaters in early 2021, when the third wave of COVID-19 was hitting the country hard. Animated films have been taking bigger market shares at the box office over the last three years," the Korean Film Council wrote in a report.
The Korea Creative Content Agency (KOCCA) pointed out in its "2022 Animation Industry White Paper" that the rise in one-person households and the spread of "kidult culture" (a compound word for kid and adult) has led to the popularity of animated films.
Kidult culture usually refers to cultural activities enjoyed by people in their 20s and 30s who are yearning for comfort in products and experiences that remind them of their childhood.
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