Korea Box Office: ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One’ is Hollywood’s Second Best Opening This Year

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Theatrical cinema in July enjoyed its highest revenues since pre-pandemic times, with global box office hitting $4.54 billion during the month. “This is the single highest-grossing month since before the pandemic began.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Upcoming female-led mystery-thriller series “Mask Girl” sees an unassuming office worker secretly rise the heights as a popular, masked online model and, in a downward spiral, become Prisoner #1047. Seemingly repentant, she secretly plots her escape. The Korean-produced show employs three different actors Ko Hyun-jang, Nana and a yet-to-be-revealed newcomer to represent the Kim Mo-mi character in her different evolutions.Netflix will Thursday drop a trailer and three separate posters intended to create intrigue as to Kim’s real nature, ahead of the series’ Aug.

split from husband Joe Manganiello.The “Top Gun” superstar, 61, briefly wooed the “Modern Family” actress, 51, back in 2005, shortly before he fell for Katie Holmes, 44. “They do have that history already, even if it was more of a brief dalliance than a fully-fledged romance,” a source told UK’s Heat magazine, as per The Mirror. “They had a special time together partying in the Hollywood Hills and having a blast.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Japanese anime series took four of the top ten places in streaming service Netflix’s latest global chart of non-English-language shows. The top title of the week July 24-30 was Brazilian teen crime drama series “Sintonia,” in its fourth season. Japanese animation series have long been key audience drivers in Japan and other parts of Asia.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief “Creation of the Gods I: Kingdom of Storms,” the first part of Wuershan’s big-budget “Fengshen Trilogy,” topped the mainland China box office for the second weekend and expanded its week-on-week haul by 35%. ‘Barbie’ also showed signs of resilience in a market where it opened a week earlier in a disappointing fifth place. “Creation of the Gods I” grossed $57.6 million.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief There is female empowerment in Korean cinemas, but it is coming more from local characters, than global hit “Barbie.” Female-led crime action film “Smugglers” dominated the weekend at the South Korean box office and pushed aside “Mission: impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” which had headed the chart for the previous two sessions. “Smugglers” earned $9.31 million between Friday and Sunday, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic), giving it a nearly 54% market share. Over its full five opening days, the film has built up a cumulative total of $13.1 million.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Margot Robbie, America Ferrara and director Greta Gerwig visited South Korea early on the promotional tour for ‘Barbie’ (without Ryan Gosling). But their charm failed to translate into strong box office performance in the country and the film opened anonymously in fourth place over the weekend. “Barbie” earned just $1.19 million between Friday and Sunday and $1.91 million over its opening five days, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). Worth just 8% of the nationwide weekend total, “Barbie’s” scores were barely better than fellow new release title “Insidious: the Red Door.” That earned $1.17 million between Friday and Sunday and $1.90 million over five days.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief While “Barbie” was romping to box office records in North American and scoring strongly in many international territories, the pink phenomenon could muster only fifth place in China, the world’s second largest movie market, on its opening weekend. “Barbie” managed $8.2 million in its opening three days, according to data from consultancy firm Artisan Gateway. Local box office sources show the film trapped in that position on all three days of the weekend session, as the locally-produced titles jostled for leadership and swapped positions. Somewhat encouragingly, the daily score for “Barbie” had increased by Sunday as it was given more screening sessions by Chinese exhibitors.

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 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.

according to IMDB’s Box Office Mojo.The action spy flick, which the Post lauded as “summer’s best movie,” was released in select theaters on Monday, with a wider release on Wednesday.“Sound of Freedom,” which is in third last week, moved up to the No. 2 spot, earning close to $7.5 million.

Todd Gilchrist editor Named after a word that sounds similar in Korean to both “spring” and “tiger,” Pom Klementieff has appropriately showcased ebullience and viciousness throughout her career — and especially in the past few months. In May, she reprised her role as Mantis in “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3,” empathetically shepherding her fellow outcasts through an adventure to save Rocket Raccoon (Bradley Cooper) from unapologetic MCU villain the High Evolutionary (Chukwudi Iwuji). She also appears in “Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One” as Paris, a ruthless assassin who will stop at nothing to kill Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) and anyone else who gets in her way. Ahead of “Dead Reckoning Part One,” Klementieff spoke to Variety about her character in the film, whose backstory she worked closely with Cruise and writer-director Christopher McQuarrie to develop. In addition to talking about how she “manifested” the opportunity to be a part of the franchise, she revealed the panorama of influences — from Jean-Paul Belmondo to animal videos on YouTube — she enlisted to ensure that audiences never forget Paris.

“Mission: Impossible III” to prevent a college prankster from flying “insulting” airplane banners aimed at Tom Cruise and his controversial religion.Documents passed down from a reportedly former top Scientology executive to the Daily Mail include a letter from the church’s “Watchdog Committee” from its “Office of Special Affairs,” ordering someone named “Linda” and the church’s “Director/Commanding Officer in the Office of Special Affairs, International Division” to “find out everything you can about them and let me know at once.”The documents, published Thursday, claim that Stephen “Josh” Schofield, a then-21-year-old University of Central Florida student, raised about $3,500 on the online forum offtopic.com to “sabotage” the movie’s May 4, 2006, premiere at Grauman’s (now TCL) Chinese Theatre.Schofield had hired two airplanes to fly over the theater with banners reading: “The baby belongs to Xenu” — referring to Cruise and his then-partner Katie Holmes’ newborn daughter Suri — and “Hail Xenu (Heart) OT [Off Topic].”Xenu refers to the “galactic overlord” in Scientology’s mythology. Scientology’s chief spokesperson Karin Pouw told the Daily Mail that she had no knowledge of the incident and could not locate any documents.

Naman Ramachandran Disney releases “Elemental” and “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” were locked in a near dead heat at the U.K. and Ireland box office, with the animated elements edging out the veteran archaeologist. “Elemental” debuted with £3.049 million ($3.876 million), according to numbers from Comscore. In its second weekend, “Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny” whipped up £3.046 million ($3.873 million) for a close second and now has a total of £13.1 million. If looking at weekend numbers alone, Harrison Ford’s last adventure as the man in the hat won the race as the “Elemental” numbers include “limited secret sneak previews from across the market,” according to Disney.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Pixar animation film “Elemental” expanded further at the South Korean box office in its fourth weekend of release, giving the film its third weekend triumph in four weeks of release. “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One” took third place from preview screening ahead of its official release on Wednesday. “Elemental” earned $6.11 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 14% increase on its previous weekend performance and was the best of its four weekends so far. It also increased its market share to 49%, also its strongest market position, despite only adding a handful of additional screens.

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.

Tom Cruise turned 61 on Monday, but no one would know it from all the physically demanded stunts he does in “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One.” And if the actor has his way, he’ll keep doing stunts like that for another couple of decades, like Harrison Ford in the “Indiana Jones” franchise. READ MORE: ‘Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning’ Review: The Humanity Behind Ethan Hunt’s Mask Is Finally Exposed In Exhilarating Part One As the seventh “Mission: Impossible” film hits theaters next week, Cruise has no plans to take it easy in the latter stages of his career.

Tom Cruise is just getting started. The 62 year old actor has been promoting her latest film, “Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning - Part One,” his seventh time playing the iconic role of Ethan Hunt. In a new interview, Cruise revealed he wants to keep playing the role for 20 more years.