'Broker' tops 1 mln admissions

"Broker," the first Korean-language film project by Japanese auteur Hirokazu Kore-eda, surpassed 1 million admissions Saturday, the movie's local distributor said.

The film hit the milestone at 8:30 a.m., becoming Kore-eda's first film to reach 1 million in South Korea, CJ ENM said.

Released June 8, the flick was at No. 3 after "The Witch: Part 2. The Other One" and "The Roundup" at the daily box office in the country Friday.

Starring Song Kang-ho, Gang Dong-won and singer-and-actress Lee Ji-eun, better known as IU, "Broker" is about people on a road trip searching for possible adoptive parents of a newborn left in a baby box.

Song won best actor at this year's Cannes Film Festival for his role as Sang-hyun, who steals an unattended infant left by its parents in a baby box and sells it to parents who need babies, in the film.

The Korean action comedy "The Roundup," the sequel to the 2017 hit movie "The Outlaws," exceeded 11 million admissions Friday, according to data from the Korean Film Council the following day. It took only a week for the film to add 1 million to its symbolic audience record of 10 million.

"The Roundup," starring Ma Dong-seok, became the 24th most-viewed film of all time in South Korea, beating Marvel's superhero movie "Avengers: Age of Ultron," a 2015 film that sold 10,494,499 tickets. (Yonhap)