In the context of incurring hundreds of billions of won in losses in the film business, it seems that CJ ENM found it difficult to abandon the late Lee Sun-kyun‘s film.
CJ ENM announced that ‘Project Silence’ is scheduled to be released this July.
‘Project Silence’ is a film that CJ produced with a pure production cost of 20 billion won.
This is CJ ENM’s reversal card. The lead actors’ performances received praise, showcasing their potential, and the film’s quality stood out, showing signs of success even before its domestic release.
‘Project Silence’ has been well-received for its overwhelming disaster scenes and dynamic storyline, and it’s expected to attract 4 million viewers, breaking even, once released.
‘Project Silence’ was the only Korean film officially invited to the non-competitive section of the 76th Cannes Film Festival last year, where it received a standing ovation lasting four minutes.
As CJ ENM’s once dominant film business declined, they finally decided to release Lee Sun-kyun’s last film, ‘Project Silence’, which they had been hesitating to release.
CJ ENM, a traditional powerhouse that produced numerous hits such as ‘Extreme Job,’ ‘Veteran,’ and ‘Parasite,’ has plummeted to last place in the film distributor rankings.
According to the Korean Film Council, CJ ENM’s box office failures last year resulted in a market share of only 6.5%. This placed them essentially at the bottom among major distributors.
Even CJ ENM’s highly anticipated film ‘Alienoid Part 2’ failed at the box office, reportedly resulting in losses.
CJ ENM incurred hundreds of billions of won in losses in the film business last year. Every film they released consecutively failed at the box office. None of the films released last year exceeded 1 million viewers.
This year, CJ ENM’s ambitious project ‘Alienoid Part 2’ attracted only 1.5 million viewers. The break-even point was known to be around 7 million, but it did not even surpass the 1.54 million viewers of Part 1.
Although CJ ENM managed to barely turn a profit, the film business still suffers significant losses.
Meanwhile, although online video services (OTT) surpassed theaters in film viewership, it was found that more consumers still visit theaters to watch the latest releases.
According to a ‘Film Consumer Behavior Survey’ conducted by consumer research firm Consumer Insight, over the past year, 74% of consumers watched films via OTT compared to 66% who watched in theaters. However, for the latest theater releases, 37% of respondents said they preferred to watch in theaters compared to 33% who preferred to watch via OTT.
Source: daum
