[HanCinema's Box Office Review] 2017.11.03 - 2017.11.05

"Ragnarok" still rules despite stiff competition from "The Bros"...

"Thor: Ragnarok" stood its ground against local writer/director Chang You-jeong's new comedy-drama, "The Bros". From 1,047 screens, down from 1,640, the seventeenth film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe added 833,949 admissions (38.31%), bringing its total tally in Korea to 3.7 million, or $28.8 million. Worldwide, from a production budget of $180 million, "Thor: Ragnarok" (starring a more comedic Chris Hemsworth) has grossed nearly half a billion dollars. Taika Waititi's "Thor" now needs another 256,000 admissions to overtake "The Fortress" (3.8 million) and enter this year's top ten.

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"The Bros" is Chang You-jeong's second feature film after the 2010 romantic comedy, "Finding Mr. Destiny" starring Lim Soo-jung and Gong Yoo, which managed a little over a million admissions around this same time of year. Chang's new comedy was very competitive: from 889 screens, just 158 less than "Thor", "The Bros" captured 26.74% of the weekend sales (605,688 admissions), or $4.5 million. The film stars Ma Dong-seok, Lee Dong-hwi and Lee Hanee.

The sleeper hit "The Outlaws" (also starring Ma Dong-seok, alongside Yoon Kye-sang) competed over Chuseok against Hwang Dong-hyuk's historical film "The Fortress" but has since stayed on to become the fifth highest-grossing film of the year with 6.3 million admissions ($46.8 million), 266,586 of which (12.32%) came from this past weekend. "The Outlaws" is now 219,000 admissions behind Ryoo Seung-wan's "The Battleship Island", the fourth highest-grossing film of the year.

Jeong Ji-woo's eighth film, "Heart Blackened", entered the fray in fourth with 238,808 admissions (10.63%). Jeong's new crime thriller stars Choi Min-sik, Park Shin-hye and Ryu Jun-yeol in a remake of the 2013 Chinese film "Silent Witness" by director Fei Xing. "Let Me Eat Your Pancreas", a Japanese romance drama, fell two places to fifth with 74,716 admissions (3.39%), followed by the eight film in the popular "Saw" horror franchise, "Jigsaw". Internationally, the Spierig Brothers' "Jigsaw" has already banked six times its production cost of $10 million; in Korea, from 175 screens, it's first weekend out yielded $475,449 from 58,409 admissions (2.85%).

"Monkey King : The Hero" is the debut film of Chinese director Tian Xiaopeng. The film was released in China back in July and arrived in Korea last Thursday. The film underperformed: from 212 screens it managed just 13,209 admissions (0.53%), or $88,401. Right on its heels came a re-release of the 2007 Irish musical "Once" by director John Carney with 13,140 (0.6%) for eighth.

The American disaster film"Geostorm" entered in second place the weekend after Chuseok, then fell to fourth last weekend, and now sits in ninth with 1.03 million admissions ($7.5 million), 12,122 (0.46%) of which were earned over the weekend. The final spot went to the third new local entry to make the top ten, Pang Eun-jin's melodrama "Method" starring Park Sung-woong and Yoon Seung-ah. Bang's fifth film, which is just 82-minutes long, came away from its first weekend out with 8,771 admissions (0.39%).

Korean Box Office - Admissions for the Weekend 2017.11.03 - 2017.11.05 (www.kobis.or.kr)

- Christopher Wheeler