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[HanCinema's Box Office Review] 2015.02.13 ~ 2015.02.15

Agents foreign and domestic dominate Valentine's Day weekend...

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Valentine's Day weekend welcomed a string of new hopefuls into the game as six fresh players shook up sales to helped spread the love. But of those new entries, it was the return of "Detective K" that came away with the biggest piece of the box office pie.

Kim Seok-yoon's "Detective K: Secret of the Lost Island" attracted 729K (32.4%) from 811 screens to outplay its nearest rival: "Kingsman: The Secret Service". "Detective K" was released back in 2011 by Kim and garnered 4.7M stubs from early January to late March, and the sequel retains the popular comical duo of Kim Myung-min and Oh Dal-soo, but this time Lee Yeon-hee joins them to raise to stakes.

Matthew Vaughn's action spy comedy "Kingsman: The Secret Service" (starring Colin Firth, Samuel L. Jackson, Mark Strong, Taron Egerton, and Michael Caine) put on a good show for second, claiming over 547K (25.5%) across 706 screens around the country. The film is based on the comic book "The Secret Service" by Mark Millar and Dave Gibbons: a tip of the hat to the classic canon of Britain's secret service.

Last weekend's number one, "C'est Si Bon" by Kim Hyun-seok, was muscled down the chart by the above agents, but the 216K it charmed from Valentine's weekend was enough to push it past a million admissions. This is the second weekend out for Kim's romcom, and so far it's pocketed $7.8M.

In fourth place, and down two, fell Disney's Oscar contender "Big Hero 6". Disney's promising animation entered in first two weeks ago, but the competition in Korea is heating up and stubs have at times been hard to harvest. This weekend the film managed 141K from 434 screens (6%), which moves its total tally now in Korea to 2.4M ($17.7M); worldwide this animated blockbuster has banked over $521M in its run up to potential Oscar glory.

The popular Japanese character "Doraemon" recently arrived on Korea's screens in the 3D form of "Stand by Me Doraemon" (with the story roughly taken from the first seven volumes of the manga series). It claimed 139K admissions during its first weekend (5.7%) and also managed to bump this year's local star (JK Youn's "Ode to My Father") down to sixth.

Last weekend "Ode to My Father" became the second highest grossing Korean film of all time, with only "The Admiral: Roaring Currents" (17.6M) floating high above it. Yoon's war drama added 120K to its colossal cause, which now sits at an incredible 13.3M ($94.1M). The American-Indian adaptation "Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return" (based on L. Frank Baum's novel "Dorothy of Oz") settled in seventh with 88.7K stubs (3.6%), followed by the the latest film in the popular "Detective Conan" Japanese animated series: "Detective Conan: The Disappearance of Conan Edogawa, The Worst Two Days in History" (69.8K - 2.8%).

Lastly, the weekend was round out by Sergei Bodrov's epic fantasy "Seventh Son" (another adaptation, this one based on "The Spook's Apprentice" by Joseph Delaney), and Yoo Ha's "Gangnam Blues", which was snuffed over Valentine's weekend and fell from fifth position down (and almost out) to tenth; they claimed 48K (2.1%) and 29K (1.4%) respectively.

 

Last weekend's report: [HanCinema's Box Office Review] 2015.02.06-2015.02.08 

 

Korean Box Office - Admissions for the Weekend 2015.02.13 - 2015.02.15 (www.kobis.or.kr)

# Films Release date Week-end Total
1 "Detective K: Secret of the Lost Island" (조선명탐정 : 사라진 놉의 딸) 2015/02/11 729 609 961 542
2 "Kingsman: The Secret Service"   547 387 713 546
3 "C'est Si Bon" (쎄시봉) 2015/02/05 216 680 1 091 768
4 "Big Hero 6"   141 291 2 475 836
5 "Stand by Me Doraemon" (STAND BY ME ドラえもん)
  139 638 157 151
6 "Ode to My Father" (국제시장) 2014/12/17 120 883 13 352 034
7 "Legends of Oz: Dorothy's Return"   88 716 103 503
8 "Detective Conan: The Disappearance of Conan Edogawa, The Worst Two Days in History" (名探偵コナン 江戸川コナン失踪事件~史上最悪の二日間~)   69 886 80 145
9 "Seventh Son"   48 006 74 742
10 "Gangnam Blues" (강남 1970) 2015/01/21 29 857 2 167 222
Korean movies only  
  "The Strong and Mini Special Forces: The Attack of a New Villain" (최강전사 미니특공대 : 새로운 악당의 습격) 2015/02/05 29 099 122 127
  "How to Steal a Dog" (개를 훔치는 완벽한 방법) 2014/12/31 6 756 263 469
  "Love Forecast" (오늘의 연애) 2015/01/14 2 427 1 891 271
  "A Matter of Interpretation" (꿈보다 해몽) 2015/02/12 1 082 2 382
  "Shoot Me in the Heart" (내 심장을 쏴라) 2015/01/28 745 383 991
  "Lost Flower: Eo Woo-dong" (어우동: 주인 없는 꽃) 2015/01/29 555 12 825
  "My Love, Don't Cross That River" (님아, 그 강을 건너지 마오) 2014/11/27 426 4 793 421
  "The Basement Satellite" (망원동 인공위성) 2015/02/05 186 2 197
  "Undercover Agent Park Munsu" (암행어사 박문수, 1962) - Re-release   182 854
  "Chronicle of a Blood Merchant" (허삼관) 2015/01/15 155 955 037

- C.J. Wheeler (@WoolgatheristKoreaOnTheCouch)

 


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