“Inside Out 2” enjoyed another stellar second weekend at the South Korean box office, and again led from local thriller “Hijack 1971.” But unlike in the previous session, the pair of frontrunners did not have the field to themselves. Local title “Handsome Guys” opened in third place and “A Quiet Place: Day One” fourth. with respectable numbers
“Inside Out 2” recorded a week-on-week drop of 31% to score $7.09 million between Friday and Sunday, according to data from Kobis the box office tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). Its market share through the weekend was a still powerful 51%.
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Those performances give the film a $39.3 million cumulative after 19 days in Korean cinemas. They also confirm “Inside Out 2” as the third highest-scoring film released in the country this year. It is also far ahead of “Wonka” as the most watched import title of 2024.
Holding on to second place was “Hijack 1971,” a fact-based Korean kidnap story about an airplane hijacking during which an explosion caused the pilot to lose an eye. Starring Ha Jung-woo and Yeo Jin-goo, the film took $2.33 million in second place, down from $3.36 million, and holding a 17% market share.
Comedy-horror, “Handsome Guys” earned $2.28 million between Friday and Sunday. Over its five-day opening run, it accumulated $3.06 million.
“A Quiet Place: Day One” stole $1.52 million over the weekend. And amassed $2.51 million over five days.
Jonathan Glazer’s “Zone of Interest” held on to fifth place for a second time. It earned $65,900 in its fourth weekend, for a cumulative of $1.17 million since releasing on June 5.
German animation film “Shorty and the Legend of the Enchanted Reef” opened in sixth place. It earned $55,800 over the weekend and $67,000 over its opening four days.
Japanese animation, “Haikyu! The Dumpster Battle” took seventh place with $52,800 for a total of $5.21 million after six weekends.
“Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” took $50,800. It has now reached $11.9 million since releasing on May 22.
“The Taste of Things” nibbled on $39,000 in ninth place. After 12 days in Korean cinemas, it has accumulated $205,000.
Japanese animation, “The Birth of Kitaro: Mystery of GeGeGe” brought up tenth place with $34,700. That gave it a three-weekend cumulative of $226,000.
June represented a month of consolidation at the Korean box office, with gross revenues of KRW108 billion ($78.2 million) earned from 11.3 million admissions. Those figures were almost identical to the preceding month of May. June 2023 was stronger, at KRW145 billion, earned from 14.5 million admissions.
The year-to-date total at the year’s half-way point is KRW610 billion ($442 million), earned from 62.9 million ticket sales. The first six months of last year recorded earnings of KRW607 million from 51.3 million ticket sales. While that suggests that more people are going to Korean cinemas it appears that the unit price of cinema tickets has come down significantly – albeit not down to pre-pandemic levels. The 2024 average price is KRW9,700 ($7.02), compared with KRW11,800 ($8.55) in the first half of 2023.
The market still looks weak when compared with the pre-COVID era. In the first six months of 2019 gross national box office was KRW931 billion, earned from 109 million admissions. The ticket price average in the first half of 2019 was KRW8,500.
