Korean Box Office: Hide and Seek Ekes Out Another First Place (08/23-08/25, 2013)

In the last weekend before many schools start their new terms, business had a last hurrah with 3.24 million tickets sold over the frame, approximately 30% more than last year. A new Hollywood release dampened the market share somewhat, but the take for local product still came in at a powerful 63% (versus 78% in 2012).

	Title	Release Date	Market Share	Weekend	Total	Screens
1	Hide and Seek	13/08/14	33.60%	1,080,521	4,078,258	659
2	Now You See Me (us)	13/08/22	28.40%	917,545	1,068,885	691
3	The Flu	13/08/14	13.10%	430,601	2,695,052	508
4	Snowpiercer	13/07/31	10.30%	322,228	8,795,972	443
5	The Terror Live	13/07/31	5.50%	173,845	5,401,252	335
6	Epic (us)	13/08/07	2.30%	84,711	945,589	252
7	R.I.P.D. (us)	13/08/22	1.90%	59,796	74,201	268
8	Grandmasters (ch)	13/08/22	1.20%	38,378	51,288	193
9	Turbo (us)	13/07/25	0.80%	27,329	1,913,815	112
10	Two Mothers (fr)	13/08/22	0.90%	27,123	39,901	188

Repeating at number one following a mere 20% drop was surprise hit local thriller Hide and Seek, which brought in another 1,080,521, edging its total over 4 million. It should become the seventh film this year to cross the 5 million milestone within a fortnight. The previous record for a year was only four, set and matched in 2005 and 2006, respectively.

A new Hollywood film, Now You See Me, was finally given a chance to make an impact, and it almost took the top spot with 917,545. A potent debut for the high concept caper film but strong competition ahead will likely hurt its business going forward.

Less successful was The Flu, which, following a solid debut, lost 55% of its audience. It brought in another 430,601 admissions and seems like it will slink off the chart quickly, though not before recording 3 million admissions, a solid figure it will likely achieve within the next week or ten days.

Bong Joon-ho's Snowpiercer took a similar dive and now looks unlikely the edge over the ten million admissions mark. Still, with an additional 322,228 banked, it looks set to pass 9 million before long.

Rounding out the top five was The Terror Live. It added another 173,845 tickets to its haul, which now stands at a robust 5.4 million.

Next week's big release will be Hollywood sci-fi Elysium, starring Matt Damon. The pic seems to have been pushed back in order not to go up against Snowpiercer and other Korean blockbusters during the month, but with a heavy marketing push, it appears poised for a number one debut.

Source: KOBIS

The Korean Box Office Update is a weekly feature which provides detailed analysis of film box office sales over the Friday to Sunday period in Korea. It appears every Sunday night (Korean Standard Time) on Modern Korean Cinema. For other weekly features, take a look at Korean Cinema News and the Weekly Korean Reviews. Reviews and features on Korean film also appear regularly on the site. 

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