Review: RED FAMILY's High Concept Suffers From Stilted Delivery

By Pierce Conran

Though as a theme it has spawned some of Korean cinema's biggest hits, including Shiri (1999), Joint Security Area (2000), Silmido (2003), Taegugki (2004) and Welcome to Dongmakgol (2005), the representation of North Korea on screen has always been a thorny one. It's a sensitive topic that is consistently affected by ebbing political tides. Though many different styles of narrative crop up relating to the Korean republic's Northern neighbor, those that have been most palatable to the public have featured themes of camaraderie across the demilitarized zone, films that stripped characters (mostly soldiers) of their ideologies and showed them for what they really were, which is of course people that are not all that dissimilar from one another.

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KBO: Masquerade Goes for 5-in-a-Row and on Track for 10 Million (10/12-10/14, 2012)

Masquerade Goes for 5-in-a-Row and on Track for 10 Million

	Title	Release Date	Market Share	Weekend	Total	Screens
1	Masquerade	9/13/12	36.80%	683,845	9,344,967	675
2	A Company Man	10/11/12	27.00%	468,300	576,744	549
3	Looper (us)	10/11/12	11.60%	201,278	250,121	386
4	Ghost Sweepers	10/3/12	5.70%	112,637	844,889	316
5	Dangerous Liaisons	10/11/12	6.00%	106,821	139,370	334
6	Brave (us)	9/27/12	4.70%	90,114	1,072,603	325
7	Taken 2 (us)	9/27/12	3.40%	58,376	2,267,568	281
8	Frankenweenie (us)	10/11/12	1.60%	26,638	30,327	226
9	Spy	9/20/12	0.70%	13,311	1,302,020	105
10	Ted (us)	10/3/12	0.70%	11,685	256,849	80

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KBO: Masquerade Still Top After Enormous Holiday Week (10/05-10/07, 2012)

Masquerade Still Top After Enormous Holiday Week

	Title	Release Date	Market Share	Weekend	Total	Screens
1	Masquerade	9/13/12	48.00%	849,999	8,220,479	867
2	Taken 2 (us)	9/27/12	16.20%	271,598	2,094,497	507
3	Ghost Sweepers	10/3/12	14.80%	264,961	617,456	479
4	Brave (us)	9/27/12	10.40%	188,398	963,115	478
5	Spy	9/20/12	4.10%	73,413	1,255,749	296
6	Ted (us)	9/27/12	3.00%	49,642	217,239	204
7	Wolf Children (jp)	9/13/12	1.30%	24,286	297,537	124
8	Tad the Lost Explorer (us)	9/20/12	0.50%	10,432	202,045	96
9	Take This Waltz (ca)	9/27/12	0.40%	6,291	19,412	22
10	13 (us)	10/3/12	0.30%	5,760	8,670	108

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KBO: Masquerade Lords Over Chuseok Holiday (09/28-09/30, 2012)

Masquerade Lords Over Chuseok Holiday

	Title	Release Date	Market Share	Weekend	Total	Screens
1	Masquerade	9/13/12	47.70%	1,379,364	5,234,423	935
2	Taken 2 (us)	9/27/12	27.80%	776,843	962,350	682
3	Spy	9/20/12	9.30%	275,007	840,498	454
4	Brave (us)	9/27/12	7.40%	208,613	223,901	435
5	Ted (us)	9/27/12	2.40%	66,326	83,150	248
6	Ghost Sweepers	10/3/12	1.60%	48,271	53,628	176
7	Wolf Children (jp)	9/13/12	0.90%	28,266	217,147	145
8	Tad the Lost Explorer (us)	9/20/12	0.70%	20,515	127,868	194
9	Pieta	9/6/12	0.60%	18,365	570,949	142
10	Resident Evil 5 (us)	9/13/12	0.40%	10,870	550,480	132

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KBO: Masquerade Still King (09/21-09/23, 2012)

Masquerade Still King

	Title	Release Date	Market Share	Weekend	Total	Screens
1	Masquerade	9/13/12	60.50%	1,192,689	3,227,946	922
2	Spy	9/20/12	16.80%	341,696	415,422	576
3	Resident Evil 5 (us)	9/13/12	5.70%	101,271	501,391	331
4	Ted (us)	9/20/12	3.90%	81,313	100,920	301
5	Pieta	9/6/12	3.50%	69,518	505,744	292
6	Wolf Children (jp)	9/13/12	2.90%	61,269	169,760	220
7	The Bourne Legacy (us)	9/6/12	2.10%	39,773	998,212	262
8	Traffickers	8/29/12	1.90%	36,518	1,618,528	192
9	The Thieves	7/25/12	0.40%	6,969	12,944,840	86
10	London Boulevard (uk)	9/20/12	0.30%	6,735	11,617	131

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KCN: Oscar Shortlist, Festival News and Trailers (08/23-08/29, 2012)

Oscar news this week and a number of festival items, not to mention posters and trailers.

KOREAN CINEMA NEWS

KOFIC Announces Shortlist for 2013 Oscars
A team is being assembled by the Korean Film Council to deliberate over the merits of five recent Korean features hoping to become to next selection to represent the nation in the Foreign-Language Oscar race. This year's contenders include Im Sang-soo's Taste of Money, Hong Sang-soo's In Another Country, Kim Ki-duk's Pieta (which is having its world premiere next month at Venice, the gangster pic Nameless Gangster and Lee Byung-hyun period drama Masquerade, which opens next month in Korea.

Over the past few years there has been some consternation regarding the eventual picks, which have included Crossing (2008), A Barefoot Dream (2010) and The Front Line (2011). Films that seemed to have far better potential have been passed over, such as Lee Chang-dong's Poetry or the popular hit Sunny. This year's crop does not inspire a great deal of confidence (though few have seen the latter two yet) and imagine that 2013 will be another year without a Korean Oscar nominee. To date not a single Korean film has ever been selected. (Modern Korean Cinema, August 29, 2012)

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