No surprise that the latest HARRY POTTER opened in No. 1 this week. And with $12.1 million, that is by far the strongest opening yet for POTTER in Korea.

Not only did POTTER have 834 screens, but TRANSFORMERS is still going strong, with 661 screens. So together the two movies really dominated screens in Korea last weekend (although this Film 2.0 chart adds up to over 2,000 screens, well above Korea’s official number of less than 1,900, so apparently a few screens are getting double-counted).

I would complain more about this domination by just two films, but POTTER had the per-screen averages to justify it. Maybe everyone else was in Bucheon for the film festival…

Title – Weekend Admissions – Total Nationwide Admissions
1. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix – 1,427,700 – 1,815,100
2. Transformers – 815,000 – 5,606,900
3. The Cut – 257,400 – 328,100
4. Black House – 51,000 – 1,291,300
5. Descent – 37,100 – 214,100
6. Taxi 4 – 16,100 – 144,700
7. Shrek 3 – 11,200 – 2,813,900
8. Ocean’s 13 – 9,800 – 1,373,700
9. Live Free or Die Hard – 3,700 – 8,900
10. Lady Chatterly – 3,300 – 4,400

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN 3 dropped out of the top 10 this week, so unfortunately I was unable to unravel the mystery of its magically dropping box office. If I have time later in the month, I will try to ask someone at Disney.