Korea Box Office: ‘Elemental’ Expands Further in Fourth Weekend

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean TV series and films are increasing still further their hold on streaming audiences across East Asia. They accounted for half of viewing time in the first half of the year, according to new third-party research. Korean-made premium VOD content captured 50% of SVOD viewership and 42% of freemium viewership between January and June 2023, with a record 58 million VOD users tuning in nine East Asian territories (Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam), according to Singapore-based research and consultancy firm Media Partners Asia. The analysis is based on the measured media consumption activity of 40,000 Asia Pacific consumers, conducted by AMPD, the analysis firm’s sister company.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Exports of K-pop albums increased by 17% year on year to reach an all-time record of $133 million in the first six months of the year. The U.S. is now the second biggest overseas market for Korean music worth $25 million, having overtaken China, but still trailing Japan ($48 million), according to data from the Korea Customs Service. The next largest were Germany, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, Canada, the U.K. and France.The record was achieved despite the absence of BTS as a group (though BTS members Jimin, and Suga put out solo efforts) and saw Stray Kids, Tomorrow X Together, Seventeen, Ateez and Twice all make an international impact.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief A+E Networks has promoted Youngsun Soh to senior VP and MD of A+E Korea, and John Flanagan to senior VP and MD of A+E Japan & Southeast Asia. Saugato “Shoggy” Banerjee, who currently serves as MD of A+E Asia, is leaving the company from Sept. 30. The moves, intended to bolster operations in Asia, were announced Monday by Patrick Vien, group MD, A+E International and Steve MacDonald, president, global licensing & international. Based in Seoul, and reporting to Vien, Soh will continue to lead the growth of A+E’s business in Korea. She has led the unit since joining the company in 2017 as GM and oversaw the launch of History and Lifetime linear channels.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief China’s box office weekend was marked more by the tussle for top spot between “Never Say Never” and “Chang An” than the entry of “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One.” The Tom Cruise-starring U.S. blockbuster was the highest new release title, but landed in third place with an opening score of $25.9 million. The weekend’s top-ranked film was “Never Say Never,” a holdover title that scored $46.1 million. Lightchaser Animation-produced “Chang An San Wan Li” (aka “Chang An 30,000 Miles”) earned a shade less, at $43.9 million, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. After 11 days of official release (plus substantial previews), “Never Say Never,” written and directed by actor Wang Baoqiang (“Lost in Thailand,” “Detective Chinatown”) has already become one of the biggest hits of the year. Its cumulative stands at $212 million. “Chang An” has accumulated $96.1 million in nine days.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Tom Cruise has become a regular visitor to South Korea and, while his latest visit was more than a week ago, the impact of his efforts appeared to endure. His ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning’ got off to the second strongest start at the Korean box office of any Hollywood movie released this year. The film grossed $9.75 million between Friday and Sunday, according to Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). That represented a 60% market share, earned from some 2,400 screens. In its full opening five days (plus previews), it earned $14.2 million.

that was hoped to have come from Cruise’s box office triumph with “Top Gun: Maverick” last year.On the other hand, “Dead Reckoning” is enjoying much stronger word of mouth than “Indiana Jones 5” with an A on CinemaScore and Rotten Tomatoes scores of 96% critics and 94% audience. “Dead Reckoning” has also been reported to have stronger opening days in key overseas markets like South Korea and Great Britain, grossing $82 million internationally through Friday as it is on course for a $240 million global start.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean star Park Eun-bin is confirmed to lead Netflix’s upcoming series “Castaway Diva,” set to premiere in late 2023. Park previously starred in “Extraordinary Attorney Woo,” the hit series that featured in Netflix’s non-English global top ten chart for 21 weeks and reached the top ten titles in 57 countries. In the new series, Park brings to life the character of Seo Mok-ha, an aspiring singer turned castaway who, after being stranded on a deserted island for 15 years, commences her journey to become a diva. Joining her are renowned actors Kim Hyo-jin, Chae Jong-hyeop, Cha Hak-yeon, and Kim Joo-hun. Kim Hyo-jin portrays a once-popular singer who is the idol of Seo and who seeks a new lease of life after encountering her fan from the island.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Disney+ has set an Aug. 9 upload date for Korean series “Moving” from webtoon pioneer Kang Full. The previously announced title forms part of a 20-component slate of films and series from East Asia that will release on the Disney-backed streaming platform in the second half of 2023 and through 2024.Also from Korea is “The Worst of Evil,” a detective series in which a rural policemen is brought to the big city to bring down a DJ dealing in a potent new drug. It stars Ji Changwook, “Squid Game” actor Wi Hajun and Lim Semi. Highlights from Japan include “Tokyo Revengers: Tenjiku Arc,” the latest instalments of a popular anime franchise, and the previously announced “Dragons of Wonderhatch,” a hybrid story set in both the “real world” and an anime land where dragons and humans coexist. The multi-dimensional story stars Nakajima Sena, Okudaira Daiken and Mackenyu.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Local titles dominated at the mainland Chinese cinema box office over the latest weekend. “Never Say Never” overtook the previous sensation “Lost in the Stars” to lead another strong summer session. “Never Say Never” (aka “Octagonal”) released officially on Thursday, ahead of China’s more normal Friday system. It earned $55.3 million (RMB384 million) between Friday and Sunday, according to verified data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. To that can be added some $9.6 million from Thursday and over $60 million previews and the film finished Sunday with a cumulative of $121 million. Co-written and directed by actor Wang Baoqiang (“Lost in Thailand,” “Detective Chinatown”), the film tells a tale of a man who tries to teach orphans about martial arts. But he is publicly shamed after his efforts are misinterpreted.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The great Choi Min-sik was on hand to take early headlines at the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival (BiFan). Described somewhat blandly as “a highly reliable performer” by the Korean Film Council (KOFIC), Choi is not only the star of Korea’s top grossing film of all time “The Admiral: Roaring Currents,” he continues to be available for work of all different levels. He appears in no less than ten titles that played at the festival this week. The festival also does reliable — in its own way – as it plays up to its “stay strange” mantra, cooperates with other festivals of a similar fantasy leaning and sidesteps the political infighting that currently bedevil Korea’s best-known festivals.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Manta, one of the leading platforms for subscription-based digital comics, has unveiled plans to launch more than ten original cartoon series through the third quarter of 2023. The company, which is owned by Korea’s RIDI Corporation, launched in 2020 and has become the number one comics app on Google Play in certain territories including the U.S., Mexico and Spain.Webtoons are a made for mobile genre of comics, that have become yet another Asian entertainment category that is having fast-growing international success. Many webtoons offer vertical scrolling, opportunities for new creators and content that is immediately available in multiple languages.

J. Kim Murphy “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” is staying in line with some tempered box office expectations, still tracking to fall in line with estimates that had pegged the film with an opening between $80 million and $85 million through the Fourth of July holiday. The Harrison Ford finale earned $11.8 million on Monday, pushing its domestic total to $71 million. Unlike some other holidays, Independence Day isn’t exactly the largest box office booster — with families hitting the beach, barbecuing red meat and waiting for fireworks, filmgoing isn’t exactly at the top of the agenda for most Americans. Rather, it’s the time off around the Fourth that can offer some extra lift to studio tentpoles.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean production and distribution company SLL is riding high on the current box office success of “The Roundup: No Way Out,” the only local film this year to sell more than 10 million tickets. In the larger TV production division, it is breathing a sigh of relief with the successes of “Doctor Cha” and “The Good Bad Mother,” shows which have achieved huge local ratings and placed in Netflix’s Global non-English Top 10 charts. For the company, which rebranded last year from JTBC Studio, and which acquired U.S. producer wiip, the renewed popularity of its shows represents something of a rebound after “the underperformance of JTBC dramas in 2022.”

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The Bucheon film festival’s Network of Asian Fantastic Films project market wrapped up three days of meetings and pitching sessions on Monday with a prize ceremony that disbursed cash, post-production support and invitations to related genre film events. “The Passport,” a Tamil- and English-language Malaysian project about an Indian rockstar who is forced to confront cultural expectations and her interactions with an imaginary friend, won the headline Bucheon Award for director Ananth Subramanian and producer Bel Choo Mun. It was both a popular choice among other NAFF participants and the unanimous decision of the jury. The numerical winner was “Please Bear With Me,” which saw director Gabriela Serrano and producer Gale Osorio from the Philippines collect three prizes. The project is a sci-fi and social issues mash-up about a call center operative who gets paid in dream-time and uses it to relive her glory days as a pop star. A clearly-surprised Serrano used her second visit to the stage to explain the film’s origins as a deep frustration with seeing Filipina women stuck at the bottom of society and yet apologizing for their ambitions.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Korean tech firm CJ 4DPLEX has struck a deal with Thailand’s Major Cineplex to add two ScreenX locations in Cambodia and Thailand. One will be located at the AEON Mall Mean Chey, have almost 500 seats and have a 75-foot-wide central screen, making it the largest ScreenX auditorium in Southeast Asia. The other will be at Bangkok’s ICONSiam Mall location, debuting on July 27. ScreenX is a multi-projection system with an immersive 270-degree field of view. That creates a virtual reality-like setting with cinema quality resolution. Major’s first ScreenX launched in 2022 at its Siam Paragon location in central Bangkok.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Chinese mystery drama “Lost in the Stars” expanded in its second week on release and gave China its third biggest box office weekend of the year. The film earned $117 million, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. That was significantly up from its opening weekend of $70.7 million (RMB502 million) a week earlier and enough to make it the second biggest film on the planet, behind “Indiana Jones,” according to Comscore. After two weekends on release, it has accumulated $320 million. “Lost in the Stars” is a Chinese adaptation of a 1990 Russian movie “A Trap for the Lonely Man,” which itself was adapted from a Robert Thomas stage play. It sees a woman disappear while on an overseas trip with her husband. Just as mysteriously, she reappears at the moment that the search for her is running out of steam. But the man refuses to accept that she is the same woman and believes that she is an imposter.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Pixar animation film “Elemental” expanded at the South Korean box office in its third weekend of release and easily bested new release title “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.” “Elemental” earned $5.27 million between Friday and Sunday, according to data from Kobis, the box office tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). That represented a 38% increase on its previous weekend performance and was the best of its three weekends so far. It also increased its market share to 39%, also its strongest market position, despite only adding a handful of additional screens. After 19 days on release, “Elemental” has amassed $16.9 million from 2.25 million spectators.

SATURDAY AM: Refresh for chart…and more analysis Disney/Lucasfilm’s Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is still bound to open at the bottom of end of tracking’s projection of $60M as this morning. I saw an estimate in The Flash vicinity of $55M last night and took an Alka Seltzer out of shock. Hopefully Dial of Destiny doesn’t fall apart tonight and at least stays on course for a Mission: Impossible – Fallout type opening in the $60M range over three days. That figure might be good for exhibition and popcorn sales over the five-day holiday weekend, but it stinks for a movie that has a reported cost of $250M to near $300M before P&A.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Oh Seok-geun, head of the Asian Contents and Film Market in Busan, has resigned. Oh’s exit follows the resignation earlier this week of Busan International Film Festival chairman Lee Yong-kwan and the earlier departure of festival director Huh Moonyoung. “I submitted my resignation to the BIFF. I decided this was the best choice I could make. I hope my decision will help solve the BIFF situation,” Oh told Variety. A spokesman for the festival confirmed that Oh had tendered his resignation and said that the organization will frame its response next week.