South Korea’s weekend box office came down to 215 tickets. Japanese animated feature Chiikawa the Movie: The Secret of the Mermaid Island took the Oct. 9–11 frame with $3.13 million from 407,895 admissions, according to KOBIS, the Korean Film Council’s tracking service. Local political thriller The Assassins finished second on 407,680 admissions — a margin roughly equivalent to one extra screening’s worth of walk-ups.
A win that was not about screens
Chiikawa played on 1,067 screens and captured 29.7% of weekend business. The Assassins had the wider release at 1,312 screens and 28.78% share. Since its Sep. 30 opening, Chiikawa has grossed $9.9 million from 1,281,485 total admissions. The Assassins, which opened Sep. 23, has accumulated $21.8 million from 2,992,543 viewers and is now a few thousand tickets from the three-million mark.
The race is a useful reminder that screen count does not equal victory. In a market where local titles can generate deeper per-screening demand, a release on fewer screens can still win the frame.
Why The Assassins matters
Hur Jin-ho’s period crime drama reconstructs the 1974 assassination attempt on President Park Chung-hee. It has faced allegations of historical distortion from conservative groups, lawmakers and bereaved family members, plus defamation complaints. There were protests outside lead actor Yu Hae-jin’s residence and cast members withdrew from promotional appearances at the Busan International Film Festival. A coalition of 19 Korean film guilds issued a joint statement defending freedom of expression.
Yet the film held second place and is closing on three million admissions. For distributors, this is a case of controversy coexisting with commercial demand rather than automatically suppressing it.
The rest of the chart
- Tazza: The Song of Beelzebub — $1.4 million this weekend; $13.1 million cume.
- The Odyssey — $979,402 in its tenth weekend; $103.1 million cume, now the highest-grossing international release in Korean box office history.
- Reawakened Man — $398,045; $2.2 million cume.
- Look Back — opened sixth with $339,468; $498,804 including previews.
Overall market gross for the weekend was $10.5 million, down from $12.6 million the prior weekend.
What planners should watch
For media planners and entertainment marketers, the Korean frame is a case study in reading beyond the headline gross. Rank titles by admissions per screen, not just total gross. Watch total cume as a signal of staying power, especially when a polarizing local title keeps drawing audiences. And don’t overlook holdover catalog events like The Odyssey, which can still claim milestone value long after opening weekend.
Source: Variety
