S. Korean moviegoers decreased 5 percent last year: report

SEOUL, Jan. 14 (Yonhap) -- The number of South Korean cinema goers dropped by more than 5 percent last year, a local report said Wednesday, as the industry has been hit by an economic downturn and a surge of illegal on-line downloads.

Some 149 million people came to local theaters last year, a drop of 8.3 million,
or 5.3 percent, from the number of moviegoers in 2007, according to the Korea
Film Council.
About 88 percent of the 2,400 adults surveyed between Nov. 28 and Dec. 5 said
they saw at least one movie last year, a sharp fall from 94 percent in 2007.
People saw an average of 9 movies in 2008, compared to 12 movies in 2007.
Forty-eight percent said they illegally downloaded at least one movie on-line
last year, a slight increase of 0.5 percent.
The popularity of domestic movies also took a hit from the deluge of foreign
films released last year, the report said.
Close to 40 percent of respondents said they favored watching domestic movies,
compared to 57 percent who said they preferred Hollywood films. South Koreans
favored locally made films over foreign ones for seven consecutive years since
2001.
According to an earlier report by South Korea's largest film distributor CJ
Entertainment, domestic movies saw their worst sales in eight years in 2008, with
their market share plunging by more than 20 percent from the previous year to
42.5 percent.
The market share of domestic movies had been steadily increasing since 2002,
hitting a record-high 64.9 percent in 2006.
hayney@yna.co.kr