'Avatar' continues to shake up Korean box office

Movie poster for "Avatar" [20th Century Fox]

Hollywood blockbuster "Avatar" continued to rattle Korea's box office last week as it took its fifth-weekend win.According to the weekend estimates by the Korea Box Office Information System (KOBIS) on Monday, "Avatar" continued to dominate in theaters by attracting 720,739 viewers between January 15 and 17 to gross over nine million viewers since its release in December. On January 14, the James Cameron pic had claimed the title as the sixth most-watched film in the country's history, breaking the record which was previously set by Michael Bay's blockbuster "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" which saw an accumulated seven million viewers during its showing.Korean comic action film "WOOCHI" maintained its position behind "Avatar" for the fourth consecutive week to take second place with 433,483 viewers and a total five million viewers. Korean action thriller "No Mercy" opened with 219,718 viewers, good enough for the No. 3 position during the three-day period.The animated children's movie "Astro Boy" came in fourth with 148,474 viewers while new suspense thriller "Paranormal Activity" rounded out the top 5 this week with a total of 142,580 viewers. Other movies that made the top 10 this week were; "Lady Daddy", "Sherlock Holmes", "Wedding Dress", "Alvin and the Chipmunks 2" and "Engine Sentai Gonger VS Gekiranger." Reporter : Lucia Hong luciahong@asiae.co.krEditor : Jessica Kim jesskim@asiae.co.kr<ⓒ10Asia All rights reserved>