Theater Industry Knocked Down by Novel Coronavirus... Lowest Audience This Year

The Lowest Since April 23 Last Year... Sharp Decline Due to New Coronavirus Spread
Only Three Works with Over 10,000 Ticket Reservations

The CGV Sungshin Women's University Entrance branch in Seongbuk-gu, Seoul, confirmed as a location visited by the fifth confirmed case of the novel coronavirus infection, has suspended operations for the second day on the 2nd. Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

The spread of the novel coronavirus infection has brought silence to the theaters. According to the Korea Film Council's integrated ticketing system, the number of moviegoers who visited theaters on the previous day (the 3rd) was 139,311. This is the lowest since April 23 of last year, when it was 111,290.

This is an inevitable consequence of the spread of the novel coronavirus infection. The movies leading the box office on April 23 last year failed to attract audiences from the early stages of their release. "Birthday," which ranked first with 21,873 viewers, had a daily peak audience of only 113,329 (on April 6 last year). "The Cursed: Dead Man’s Prey," which ranked second with 10,738 viewers, also had a daily peak audience of only 48,637 (on April 20 last year).

The situation is different for "The Man Standing Next" and "Hitman." "The Man Standing Next," which attracted 782,931 viewers in a single day on the 26th of last month, only drew 56,546 viewers on this day. "Hitman," which attracted 381,023 viewers on the 26th of last month, recorded only 41,141 viewers on this day. Although they were doing well during the Lunar New Year holiday, news of the spread of the novel coronavirus infection caused a sharp decline. Both films have been released for only thirteen days.

The movies releasing this month are all facing difficulties. Even the reservation rates are alarming. "Closet," which raised expectations from the production stage with the collaboration of Ha Jung-woo and Kim Nam-gil, had only 24,072 reserved tickets as of 1:26 a.m. on the 4th. "Birds of Prey," starring Margot Robbie, also had only 24,041 reservations. Except for these two films and "Hitman" (15,074 reservations), all other movies have fewer than 10,000 reserved tickets. It is truly a comprehensive crisis.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.