What Korea is watching
The national box office, updated daily, with the part that matters to a visitor: whether the film is in a language you can follow.
Booking a ticket
Showtimes are not part of Korea's public film data, so they live with the three cinema chains. Their booking sites are Korean-language — searching the Korean title below is the quickest way through, and the counter at the cinema is the reliable fallback.
Cinema guides
- Going to the cinema in Korea: what a ticket actually gets youReserved seats, time-based pricing, ten minutes of advertising and a format war nobody explains. How a Korean cinema visit differs from the one you are used to.
- 자막 or 더빙: working out whether you will understand the filmKorean cinemas subtitle foreign films rather than dubbing them, which is good news — until the film is Korean, or animated. The rules, and the two words that tell you which screening you booked.
- How to read a Korean box office chartKorea counts admissions, not dollars, and the whole industry talks in tickets sold. What the numbers mean, why ten million is the number that matters, and what a 'diversity film' is.
- Korean film ratings, and which ones are actually checkedFive ratings, administered by a government board, printed on every ticket. What each one permits, which one requires your passport, and what the rating does not tell you.
- How to actually watch a Korean film with English subtitlesRegular screenings will not help you. Film festivals, the national archive and a well-stocked YouTube channel will — here is how each of them works.