Not a lot to report this week. Things were generally slow, I guess (typical for April).

A new No. 1 film this week, PARADISE MURDERED. Seems like an interesting story, although I have not seen it yet.

THE SHOW MUST GO ON suffered a pretty big second-week decline, plunging 58 percent. I guess people did not like it much.

Nick Cage’s GHOST RIDER opened in third. Was never a fan of the comic book.

Im Kwon-taek’s 100th film, BEYOND THE YEARS, might be an impressive achievement, but it scored a less than impressive opening, way down in seventh. SOPYONGJE (the 1993 prequel) never pulled in anything like 70,000 admissions in Seoul in its opening weekend… but that film ran for a year when it racked up its then record at the box office. That said, I still want to check out the film in the theaters while I can. I had to miss the big preview at the beginning of the month, which was very disappointing.

This Week Title…………………………………. Release Date Screens Nationwide Weekend Attendance (Seoul only) Total Attendance
1. Paradise Murdered 4.12 383 154,400 660,200
2. The Show Must Go On 4.05 374 61,200 805,100
3. Ghost Rider 4.12 240 50,600 204,200
4. 300 3.14 187 31,400 2,883,300
5. Smalltown Rivals 3.29 260 30,000 1,161,000
6. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer 3.22 186 19,000 982,600
7. Beyond the Years 4.12 201 18,800 70,200
8. Because I Said So 4.05 141 16,400 192,100
9. Black Book 3.29 36 6,500 182,500

(Source: Film2.0)

It was not one the Film 2.0 list, but KOBIS says that the No. 10 film was MUG TRAVEL. That animated film has now sold over 120,000 tickets.

French film LES CHEVALIERS DU CIEL is in 11th, with 48,000 admissions.

MEMORIES OF MATSUKO opened down in 13th, with around 4,000 admissions. But it was on just a few screens. Not a huge opening, but I hope it catches on.

Numbers were a little off this week, but March and April are usually slow periods. There were the slowest two months in 2004, and the Nos. 2 and 3 slow months last year (November was even slower).

March’s 9.77 million attendance nationwide, however, was the highest on record (up around 5,000 from last year). Korean films had a pretty bad month, as their 21.6% of the box office was the lowest percentage since December 2004.

Overall, the first quarter’s attendance of 39.56 million represents the second-best total of all time, although down 12% from last year’s 44.99 million.