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‘Venom: Let There Be Carnage’ Chews up Korea’s Box Office Weekend

Venom: Let There Be Carnage” gave a much-needed jolt to the South Korean box office with a $6.66 million opening weekend. But there were slim pickings for other titles.

The film played on nearly 2,000 screens and accounted for 81% of nationwide box office between Friday and Sunday, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic).

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Including the film’s Wednesday and Thursday opening days, “Venom 2” has $9.26 million after five days of release.

The Venom performance lifted the overall weekend box office total from a paltry $3.73 million a week earlier, to $8.17 million.

The bright opening for “Venom 2” also contrasts sharply with the poor performance of “No Time To Die” in South Korea. The James Bond film enjoyed two weeks at the top of the chart and slipped to second place with $551,000 over the most recent weekend. But its numbers have been consistently weak. “Venom 2” has a gross after five days that is largely equal to the 18-day total of No Time To Die on $9.50 million.

Korea’s box office continues to operate under COVID-restrictions on capacity. All year, the cinema industry has suffered from a lack of audience confidence and a shortage of releases by major local films. The result has been consistently depressed performances, punctuated by occasional bursts of activity.

The opening for “Venom 2” is bright in comparison with other openings this year but is still a way short of franchise opener “Venom,” which released at the same time of year in 2018. The previous “Venom” debuted with a $16.5 million opening weekend and went on to earn $30.2 million in Korean theaters.

Over the most recent weekend, Korean films “On the Line” earned $293,000 in third place, for a cumulative of $11.3 million since September 15, and “Miracle” added $155,000 in fourth spot, for a cumulative of $5.21 million.

No other film earned $100,000 over the weekend.

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