Stream K-Dramas at OnDemandKorea

Domestic movies decrease in first half

Despite the apparent huge success of local films, the Korea Media Rating Board's recent statistics showed that the total number of domestically made movies had actually decreased in the first half of this year, suggesting that perhaps it is too soon to toast to victory.

Even though the number of blockbuster movies has increased sharply, only 47 new films were made in the first half of 2004, 18 fewer than the 65 movies made during the same period last year. This is the first decrease in four years.

The future for Korean movies appeared to be considerably bright as the two movies "Silmido" and "Taegukgi" became runaway successes this year, rounding up more than 10 million local viewers, the largest number in Korean film history.

The export of Korean movies so far this year totals $37 million, and prospects for further exports are bright with "Oldboy" capturing the Grand Jury Prize at this year's Cannes Film Festival.

Some movie experts, however, have been pointing out the danger of large movies monopolizing the spotlight, as this could easily tempt investors to concentrate on producing blockbusters, which in turn would inevitably result in less funding for smaller films. And the Korea Media Rating Board's figures seem to validate those concerns.

The decrease in the number of locally produced movies and last month's drop in the market share of domestic films are expected to intensify the controversy over the screen quota system, as those numbers could be used to argue that Korean film industry is not yet strong enough to compete with Hollywood blockbusters.

Movie industry personnel are planning to protest the proposed reduction of film quotas tomorrow by suspending all moviemaking for the day.

By Shin Hae-in

Advertisement

❎ Try Ad-free