South Korean films claim narrow BO win

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Box Office News

Local and foreign films largely tied at the South Korean box office in the first nine months of the year, representing a significant improvement for Korea's home grown movies at the expense of imported titles.

Overall admissions for the nine months to September grew by 2% to 120 million and gross box office was up by 1% at ￦938 trillion ($790 million).

Within that, South Korean films claimed 62 million ticket sales or 52% of the total in the year to end of Sep, compared with 51.6 million and a 44% market share in the same period last year.

In box office revenue terms, Korean films grossed ￦462 trillion ($389 million at current exchange rates) or 49% of the nine month combined total, compared with ￦380 trillion ($320 million, also at current exchange rates) and a 41% market share, in the same period. Foreign films combined gross revenues clocked in at ￦475 trillion ($400 million), compared with ￦548 trillion ($461 million).

At 13.2 million admissions, September was only the fifth biggest month of the year, but it was the second biggest for local titles, which sold 9.64 million tickets and claimed a 73% market share.

Contributing to the strong Korean performance in September was the long run of Showbox/Mediaplex Inc 쇼박스 미디어플렉스's War of the Arrows 최종병기 활 (2011) which was released in August and by the end of September had sold 7.16 million tickets, and the September-released Unstoppable Family 가문의 영광 ４ : 가문의 수난 (2011) (pictured) with 2.32 million admissions.

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