South Korea’s Oct. 2–4 box office produced a split verdict. Data from KOBIS, the Korean Film Council’s tracking service, puts Hur Jin-ho’s political crime thriller The Assassin(s) at the top of the admissions chart with 412,012 tickets sold across 1,129 screens, earning $3.0 million and a 23.89% share of the market. Japanese animation Chiikawa the Movie: The Secret of the Mermaid Island sold fewer tickets but earned more money: $3.2 million from 405,978 admissions across 1,055 screens, or 25.31% of weekend revenue.
The gap is a reminder that admissions and gross are different rankings. Seat count measures reach; gross measures what those seats were actually sold for. A title can finish second in ticket count and still lead the revenue chart when its effective ticket price is higher.
The chart in brief
- The Assassin(s): 412,012 weekend admissions; $16.3 million cumulative from 2,233,963 admissions since Sep. 23.
- Chiikawa the Movie: $3.2 million weekend gross; $4.7 million cumulative from 604,764 admissions including previews.
- Tazza: The Song of Beelzebub: $2.2 million weekend; $10.2 million cumulative from 1,365,648 viewers.
- The Odyssey: $1.2 million in its ninth frame; $101.2 million cumulative and just under 2,000 admissions away from 12 million.
- Reawakened Man: $885,217 opening weekend; $1.4 million since its Sep. 30 release.
Why the split matters
For media planners and entertainment marketers, the winner depends on the metric you track. Admissions matter for audience reach, screen count and word-of-mouth potential. Gross matters for revenue efficiency, premium formats and revenue-based deals. Chiikawa’s top gross on fewer admissions suggests its screenings skewed towards higher-priced formats or event pricing – a useful signal if you plan around anime, fan-driven or event cinema.
The weekend also cooled from holiday levels. The overall market collected $12.6 million, down from $19.6 million the previous frame. That comparison, not the chart position alone, is the context that matters for media planning.
What to watch next
The Assassin(s) is in a political storm because it dramatizes the Aug. 15, 1974 attempt on President Park Chung-hee and the death of First Lady Yuk Young-soo. Its cast – Yu Hae-jin, Park Hae-il and Lee Min-ho – and the controversy may extend its run. The Odyssey is the milestone to watch: with 11,998,236 tickets sold, it needs fewer than 2,000 admissions to cross 12 million, a threshold Korean media treats as a landmark.
Further down the chart, Lee Chang-dong’s Venice prize winner Possible Love, South Korea’s official international feature submission, took sixth with a $1.7 million cumulative from 230,483 admissions. Warner Bros. Korea’s The Intern reached $6.1 million from 834,866 admissions, and Avengers: Endgame Encore rounded out the top 10 with $242,747 from 25,777 admissions.
For your own box-office read, don’t stop at the top line. Ask whether the leader won on admissions or gross, and compare the frame against the same period or the preceding holiday before calling it momentum.
Source: Variety
