Film on 'comfort women' tops 1 million views in 5 days

SEOUL, Feb. 29 (Yonhap) -- A local movie about the abhorrent suffering of the Korean women who were forced into sexual enslavement by imperialist Japan during World War II topped weekend ticket sales, data showed Monday.

"Spirits' Homecoming" attracted 767,071 moviegoers from Feb. 26-28, the first weekend after its cinema launch on Wednesday, according to cinema ticketing services. During the same period, the film was put on the silver screen 8,956 times nationwide and accounted for 30.4 percent of all weekend ticket sales.

The film topped 1 million views accumulatively on Sunday at 5:09 p.m., according to the film's distributor, Wow Pictures.

Despite initial difficulties on securing distributors and theaters, the historical film has posted an increasingly robust performance every day. The film snagged 23.1 percent of all ticket sales on the day of its launch, 29.6 percent on the second day and 29.7 percent on the third.

On the fourth day, the film met its break-even point to fully cover production costs, with the viewership entering the 30 percent range that afternoon.

Directed by Cho Jung-lae, the movie depicts the painful testimonies of "comfort women," who were forced to work in Japanese military brothels during the war. The movie took its cinematic motives from "Burning Women," a drawing by Kang Il-chul, one of the victims, created during her therapy sessions.

The U.S. film "Deadpool," a superhero action movie cinematized from American comic books published by Marvel Comics, stepped down a notch with 441,741 viewers. The film occupied 651 big screens and swept up 19.5 percent of the weekend ticket sales.

Starring Ryan Reynolds, "Deadpool" features the journey of a foul-mouthed former Special Forces agent who gains special powers after being disfigured and transformed into Deadpool.

Disney's animated film "Zootopia" welcomed 412,261 moviegoers at 733 silver screens this weekend. The Disney movie took up 16 percent of weekend ticket sales. The animated film flaunted the highest seat occupancy rate of 50.7 percent, or seats-to-watcher ratio.

"Zootopia" was created by the film production crew of global hits "Frozen" and "Big Hero 6," which drew 10 million people and 2.8 million, respectively.

jwc@yna.co.kr
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