South Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook's latest feature film, "Decision to Leave," has attracted high scores and favorable reviews from foreign news media following its premiere at this year's Cannes Film Festival earlier this week. Screen Daily, British film magazine Screen International's daily magazine for the film festival, reported Tuesday (French time) that the Korean film took an average score of 3.2 out of 4, the highest score yet on its Cannes jury grid for this

For “The Roundup” director Lee Sang-yong, filming a movie amid the COVID-19 pandemic was an experience he will not until the day he dies. “We visited Vietnam for the first time in September 2019. We searched for locations to shoot the film and also finished casting Vietnamese actors. We planned to start shooting there at the end of February 2020. So a week before that, part of our team went to Vietnam. Actor So Suk-ku was also there, but we soon heard from the consulate that

CANNES -- South Korean auteur Park Chan-wook has said that his latest Cannes-competing feature "Decision to Leave" is a precocious romance that is not as intense as his previous revenge-themed works, like "Oldboy" (2003), but is one that he really wanted to make. "Decision to Leave," which premiered at the 75th Cannes Film Festival on Monday (French time) as one of the in-competition films of the festival, is about a police detective who falls in love with a woman s

“The Roundup,” the sequel to the hit crime film “The Outlaws” (2017), sold more than 3.55 million tickets in the first week of its release, according to the Korean Film Council. It surpassed Marvel’s “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness” (2022), which sold 3,497,393 tickets during the first seven days of the film’s release. The sequel to the 2017 hit Korean comedy topped the local box office over the weekend -- from Friday to Sunday --

The homegrown action comedy "The Roundup" is on course to become a box office hit, luring more than 2 million people on its first weekend, data showed Monday. The sequel to the 2017 hit comedy "The Outlaws" attracted 2.53 million people from Friday-Sunday, bringing its cumulative total to 3.55 million in the five days following its release last Wednesday, according to the data by the Korea Film Council. It is the first time in more than two years that a Korean film has attrac

Director Cha Bong-joo said he created his debut feature “Good Morning” after he watched a documentary about patients at a hospice center. “As I was working on the script, I watched a documentary about a hospice center and there was one person who grabbed my attention,” Cha said at a press conference at CGV Yongsan on Thursday. “I found out that he did not have much time left, but he looked so bright and it made me shed tears. I wanted my character Soo-mi to feel

Kakao Entertainment unveiled a webtoon version of the upcoming American superhero film “Thor: Love and Thunder” Thursday. Celebrating the release of the film, the first four episodes are available free of charge. The webtoon, based on the Marvel Comics series of the same title published in 2019, revolves around the exciting journey of Thor, who seeks to solve the mystery behind Gorr the God Butcher and stop him from committing a massacre. The comic is widely recognized for Americ

The Roundup (Korea) Opened May 18 Crime Directed by Lee Sang-yong Cop Ma Seok-do heads to Vietnam to extradite a suspect. But soon after his arrival, he discovers murder cases and finds out that the vicious Korean killer (Son Sook-ku) has been committing crimes against Korean tourists for several years. Ma Seok-do decides to chase after the killer but it is not easy as Korean cops do not have investigative power in Vietnam.  Operation Mincemeat (US) Opened May 11 Drama Directed

“Ma Dong-seok is his own genre.” Korean moviegoers often say this in reference to the Korean-American movie star, also known as Don Lee, in recognition of his unique screen presence and charisma. A recent survey by online research firm PMI on Koreans aged 20-60 asked what word comes to mind when hearing his name. The answers were in the order of: “muscular/huge,” “tough/strong,” “Mavely (a combination of “Ma” and “lovely”),&rd

The action comedy "The Roundup" has set the best opening-day record among Korean films released during the COVID-19 pandemic, box-office data showed Thursday. The sequel to the 2017 hit comedy "The Outlaws" garnered about 467,000 viewers upon its debut Wednesday, accounting for 89 percent of the tickets sold on the day, according to the Korean Film Council (KOFIC). It marked the largest first-day score for a homegrown film since the new coronavirus broke out in early 2020, ou

Although “Cassiopeia” might seem like a woeful movie about a young lawyer in her 30s suffering from Alzheimer’s, the film’s director Shin Youn-shick said he focused more on portraying the father and daughter dynamic. “When I was working on the script. I watched the movie ‘The Intern’ to cool my head. That was also when I had a desire to work with (the actor) Ahn Sung-ki again,” the director said during a press conference held at Megabox theaters

Surging global demand for K-content drive international productions

South Korea's major cinema chains remained in the red in the first quarter of this year amid the protracted COVID-19 pandemic, but the lifting of distancing rules will likely provide them fresh momentum for a possible turnaround in the coming quarters, data showed Tuesday. CJ CGV, the No. 1 multiplex operator under the wing of entertainment giant CJ Group, said its operating loss reached 54.9 billion won ($42.9 million) for the first three months of 2022, narrowing from an operating deficit of 6

Hollywood blockbuster "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" surpassed 5 million admissions Tuesday, data showed. The latest Marvel Studios' flick hit the milestone at 7:20 a.m., on the 13th day of its theatrical release in South Korea, according to the official box-office data from the Korean Film Council (KOFIC). It became the fastest movie to top 5 million in the past three years, outmatching the country's biggest pandemic-era hit "Spider-Man: No Way Home," the film

“The Red Herring,” a documentary directed by Yi Seung-jun about the embattled ex-Justice Minister Cho Kuk, has raised a total of over 2.6 billion won ($2 million) from over 51,000 people on the crowdfunding platform Tumblbug as of Sunday, far exceeding its original goal of 50 million won. “I was very surprised by the Tumblbug funding result. I am moved by the support. Thank you,” Cho said in a video clip released on Tumblbug Monday. “I want to have a talk with t