“Star Trek Beyond” Hits the Red Carpet in South Korea

The third film in the reboot is set to hit South Korean screens August 18.

“I don’t think we’ve ever been received quite the same way anywhere in the world,” Chris Pine told reporters at the news conference heralding his, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg and Justin Lin’s appearances to promote Star Trek Beyond to South Korean audiences August 16, at the Grand InterContinental Seoul Parnas.

Zimbio STB Korea Premiere

Fans cames out of the woodwork in Seoul to greet the stars and director of Star Trek Beyond, and if the reception is any indication, the movie might just hit its mark in the overseas box office. While the numbers have come in lower than hoped domestically (trailing both the 2009 film and 2013’s Into Darkness), a strong international box office will all but guarantee a fourth installment in the Kelvin Timeline on the big screen.

“I hope that this allows the franchise to be able to go on for the next, hopefully, 50 years,” Lin said to reporters. It is not known whether or not The Fast and the Furious director would be tabbed to take the helm a second-straight time if a fourth film is greenlit.

Press conference aside, the event also gave the actors and director the opportunity to meet their adoring South Korean fans, who were not disappointed, receiving autographs and snapping pictures of the quartet.

VOA News STB Korea Premiere

Pegg and Quinto also took advantage of the time to discuss the values Gene Roddenberry established in his franchise. It was a terrific moment, especially coming on the eve of the 50th anniversary in September, as the film franchise has become more of a popcorn spectacle than the social commentary for which it is best known.

“It’s a franchise with all the hallmarks of a summer blockbuster, but also has a lot of heart,” Quinto stated. “It’s rooted in a message of connectivity, unity and optimism. There’s no time like this one for that kind of message to resonate.”

Embracing Roddenberry’s code of infinite diversity, Pegg discussed a future, “where we all live together with total tolerance, total acceptance. That should be our goal as a species.”

“The more we go out there, the more it’s an exploration of (the characters) as human beings. I think that’s the one thing the audience will really embrace,” Lin said, reiterating the sentiment of his actors.

Clearly, Lin and his cast get what Star Trek is truly about, which should make even the most critical fans of J.J. Abrams rebooted films smile. Abrams let it be known that he was not a fan of the series, stating in multiple interviews he grew up with a love of Star Wars (even leaving Star Trek to direct Episode VII last year).

“(Lin) was great in taking over the reins,” Quinto said of the franchise’s ninth film director in 37 years. “He had a sense of story and a desire to draw on all of our relationships. It was a seamless transition.”

“I’ve done enough sequels to know, it’s not something you just do. It’s something you earn and relationship you build with the audience globally,” Lin added.

If the South Korean turnout is any indication, that global relationship should equal a long and fruitful history for this film iteration of Star Trek. The Enterprise captain noticed and appreciated the fans zeal for the franchise.

“Thank you very much for having us, for your support, your passion for our really wonderful franchise ‘Star Trek,’ and we look forward to showing it to you,” Pine said.

Information was gathered from Reuters Asia, Korea Times and The Korea Herald for this article.

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It’s great to see the truly global appeal of Star Trek. Thanks, Gene, for creating such an enduring legacy for millions around the world to enjoy.

And so it begins… Beyond not just hits Korea this weekend but also France and Spain (and some smaller territories)… It definitly needs a serious boost box-office-wise. This is the penultimate round… Next stop September 2nd with China, Mexico and most of South America…

South Korea? Boy, these guys will go anywhere for a buck!

Hey,

I live in SK and it is a big(ish) market–it’s bigger than Canada. The issue is that Koreans do not latch onto all western franchises. If they do, you have 50 million people who might go watch the film a repeated number of times.

Spit Korea made almost $11.5 million for STID and based on the previous film will likely be the largest box office remaining after China. However, Paramount is only going to earn about 1/3rd of that box office. Unless SK earns 3x the box office it earned for STID, it’s not going to make much difference. Add to that all foreign box office has been consistently running about 30% under STID — basically ST09 numbers — there’s no reason to expect SK not to as well.

You know what the irony is? BEY has made more money for Paramount than any other movie put out by the studio this year. That’s how bad the film market is right now for new releases.

No, that’s how bad it is for Paramount, a studio that’s on the sales block, and embroiled in a corporate battle for control. They’ve made a series of bad decisions this year.

Overall 2016 year to date is up 4.7% over the same time in 2015, domestically.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/yearly/?view2=ytdcompare&view=releasedate&p=.htm

@dswynne,

Paramount released eight movies this year, most of them were low to medium budget movies. ‘Beyond’ with its $185 million budget cost more than six of those movies combined.

Florence Foster Jenkins $19 million
10 Cloverfield Lane $15 million
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot $35 million
Zoolander 2 $50 million
13 Hours $50 million
Everybody Wants Some!! $10 million

The 8th movie was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 & it cost around $135 million.

There has also been a lot of across the board drop-offs after the first week. It’s been a busy summer and there must be twice as many disappointments this years as last year (Huntsman, Independence Day, TMNT, Ghostbusters, Tarzan). So far Disney’s been the big winner with everyone else taking some bumps. The average returns for everyone else have to be down significantly from last year.

But overall, the box office is up for everyone.

That’s not fair the movie is great and the whole world needs to see it!!! Support the franchise

“Star Trek” needs a pickup in international markets, and this one is lagging behind after a significantly poorer-than-hoped-for performance at home in North America and most of Europe. Hopefully, South Korea, Japan, and especially the big one, China, will give it enough “legs” to get a 4th film green-lit. “Terminator” died as a franchise with better numbers than this, and the jury is still out on “Warcraft” which was gangbusters only in China. Both made around $440m worldwide, and “Trek” is at less than half that as of today. Not as ‘rosy’ as the article would make it seem!

While anything can happen, and there’s a universe where Asia comes to STBs rescue, that’s not likely our universe. They have to make $570 million to break even from their $185 million budget and $100 million marketing budget, since the studio only makes about half the box office take on average. This was probably similar for STID, except STID made a lot more at the box office putting them a lot closer with TV & home video sales. STB will likely only make ST09 numbers this time around putting a huge burden on film and TV to recoup the rest. Add to that Paramount didn’t seem to put as much into marketing this time around probably thinking they had established Trek internationally with their spending on STID, and the audiences would return without spending as much. China is likely the only wild card that could significantly change STBs fortunes, but then what does that do to the filmmaking if the next film is made primarily for the Chinese?

In what way are you implying that the filmnaking would chanhe if it was tailored for the Chinese? Please tell me, because I’m dying to know.

If this film hits it HUGE in China I would be so happy. And if that means we see Kirk eating with chopsticks in one scene in the next movie then goddamnit i will be absolutely delighted!

Answer my question. Your xenophobic implications would preclude you from being a part of the Star Trek universe

@Mellvar One of the starships can be named the USS Mao Zedong and the Prime Directive can be renamed the Anti-Imperialism Policy.

I hope you’re playing your namesake character here.

The implication is what any media article about catering to overseas films will tell you — more action, more explosions, less story, less dialogue. The primary reason being that the film is produced in English requiring subtitles and dubbing, which doesn’t always translate well internationally, especially when it comes to scifi. While being an enjoyable film, the movie short changes character and dialogue for more heavily weighted action scenes. Cliched villains with poorly developed backgrounds substitute for proper motive and execution. If the film does well in China, that means a lot more of that kind of film, which may also help push the franchise toward a more main stream action-centric box office to the detriment of the fans, who long for, and expect more of their Trek films.

I’ll ignore your Kirk eating with chopsticks comment.

Mellivar, I have spent the last twenty years working and living in “emerging markets,” such as Russia and Poland before EU accession. China has fit that bill for the last 10-15 years in one of many visible ways: the construction of multiplexes in towns from 50,000 to over 10 million people which did not exist before the turn of the 21st century. China has over 1.3 billion people, it has become a significant market for Hollywood films based on this brand-new infrastructure alone. Any ‘concessions’ made to Chinese audiences by filmmakers are usually done either to gain favor with Chinese censors, or because there is Chinese corporate funding (which has developed as a result of said brand-new infrastructure making China a huge market for big-ticket films, the new “Star Trek” being one of them), or both. No xenophobia, just economics!

Thanks for the education in this area. It fills in the details to what we have been hearing about this emerging market.

You wrote: Add to that Paramount didn’t seem to put as much into marketing this time around….

Really? I think 100 million is very good for the kind of numbers TREK movies usually bring in. It would be suicide to spend in the 175—200 million dollar range for a TREK movie. The blockbusters spend in that range and TREK just doesn’t compete in that arena. I think it maybe how Paramount spends their money on marketing is the issue. Waiting three months before the release date, then hitting with a blitz of advertising didn’t work this time. Also, solving the international problem of why TREK doesn’t translate well in these markets remains the challenge and the mystery that needs to be worked through.

Assuming the early plans to film in South Korea carried through to Lin’s film, there should be a nice bump there in BO receipts from the goodwill of that alone. Or did that fall through? Anyone know?

That was Bob’s film. There is no mention of South Korea in the credits for Lin’s film.

Anthony Thompson,

Web news sources report S. Korea but I’ve seen them being led astray by an errant imdb listing before.

Oh well, then I suppose one has to wonder how much hay was made in Korea about Beyond pulling up filming stakes their? Could go the other way.

Beyond should have been bigger in the UAE seeing as half of the film was shot there…

Khan,

Re:should have

But that ship sailed July 21st and it was one of the last locations developed.

Korea was scouted and secured before Dir. Orci was sacked so it had a longer swath of time to spread the buzz about STAR TREK being filmed there prior to this release.

@Khan,

Not much marketing perhaps. It came in second after ‘The Conjuring 2’ on the opening weekend, then dropped to 6th place in the second weekend!

Really hope the film does well internationally. Its such a shame it hasn’t had a bigger domestic opening.

The movie is more or less done for half the international market where it already opened, as it is domestically. This weekend should give us an excellent indication of how it’s going to perform over the next two weekends with the following markets:

Belgium 17 August 2016
Switzerland 17 August 2016
France 17 August 2016
Czech Republic 18 August 2016
South Korea 18 August 2016
Spain 19 August 2016
Norway 19 August 2016
South Africa 19 August 2016

Spain should give us an idea of how South America will do, while SK should be a good indication of China and Japan.

Israel 25 August 2016
Portugal 25 August 2016
Turkey 26 August 2016
Venezuela 26 August 2016
Argentina 1 September 2016
Brazil 1 September 2016
Chile 1 September 2016
Colombia 1 September 2016
Panama 1 September 2016
Peru 1 September 2016
China 2 September 2016
Mexico 2 September 2016
Japan 21 October 2016

“While the numbers have come in lower than hoped domestically (trailing both the 2009 film and 2013’s Into Darkness), a strong international box office will all but guarantee a fourth installment in the Kelvin Timeline on the big screen.”

The movie is already out in half of the oversea markets and it is not doing great.

=======================
Variety

Despite the hard work, the results internationally are mixed, signaling that “Star Trek Beyond” may face some headwinds on its path to profitability. The film opened in first place in 16 of the 37 markets where it launched, grossing a respectable $30 million. However, that was 14% below what “Star Trek Into Darkness” did in the same geographic spread, and the film appears to have been hit hard by the heat wave in Europe. In the United Kingdom, for instance, the opening grosses were 15% below “Star Trek” and 37% below “Into Darkness.” In Germany, they were down 29% from “Into Darkness.” And in Italy they were 8% below “Star Trek” and trailed “Into Darkness” by 5%.

“The franchise is drifting,” said Jeff Bock, an analyst with Exhibitor Relations. “The momentum has slowed overseas.”

http://variety.com/2016/film/box-office/star-trek-beyond-box-office-2-1201821821/

STB came in 8th Tuesday night, behind FLORENCE FOSTER JENKINS. THe only good news is that it just broke $1 million. Of course the bad news is that FFJ earned over $100 thousand more …

This movie fixed Trek after the disastrous Into Darkness… Beyond deserves to actually turn a profit and justify some sequels. Fingers crossed that this is the return to Wagon Train to the Stars TOS Star Trek I think a lot of us have been waiting to get back into.
I am personally worried after reading some of the news articles here that poor performance caused by a lack of faith after Into Darkness will result in future Trek being a horrid combination of Into Darkness nonsensical plots combined with bland boring TNG Braga Trek – the worst of both worlds.

If we want another Kelvin Trek movie, (I do) then grab a friend or spouse and go see it again.
I really enjoyed BEYOND, once I got past the go boom stuff.

On another note, going to the multiplex is A NIGHTMARE these days.
Standing in line, paying a fortune for popcorn and watching COMMERCIALS before the film is annoying to myself. I can’t hit pause or go to the restroom at the multiplex.
I’m used to watching what I want, when I want, and how I want to view it.

I would pay $30 or $40 to have it available on my 55″ UHD TV as a PPV.
I’d like to have an 8-12 hour viewing window.
I usually go to ONLY ONE movie a year because I despise the experience at the multiplex.

Any business people out there listening?

You gave me a really good idea … I was hoping it was at my local AMC Dine-In theater, but it’s not. That would have been a perfect way to see it again!

As for the other, don’t worry — Hollywood would have already delivered that option to you if weren’t for the pesky theater owners who fear they will go out of business.

Ugh! The other theater I wanted to try out with food service is only showing STB during afternoon matinees … Not sure if it will still be there this weekend …

The only movies making money are animated family fare and comic book stuff.

gmakin,

My father, a Korean War Veteran, had a great affinity for the Korean communities in the U.S. I find it very odd that the only South Korean cinema exhibitions making money are “animated family fare and comic book stuff”.

Disinvited,

I was talking about the international box office.

So Dauman is officially out at Viacom, and Tom Dooley has been elected interim CEO thought at least September. Dauman gets to present his proposal to sell 49% of Paramount to an outside investor, but it’s unlikely to pass. With the stock down 45% over the last two years, an STB failure at the box office could have serious implications. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Les Moonves running Viacom in the near future, and we all know what he did to ENT when he got his hands on UPN. This really might be e end of Bad Robots involvement with Trek. If so, my guess is Moonves will pull the plug on Trek features until STD and All Access is off the ground …

Curious Cadet,

Re: Moonves running Viacom in the near future

Is this your way of suggesting that we sing a chorus or two of HANG DOWN YOUR HEAD TOM DOOLEY?

Clever … But I just realized that Paramount produced Ben Hur. Suddenly Paramount has a bigger problem than STB. I’m thinking Brad Grey is about to lose his job. Tom Dooley won’t likely can him, but you can bet his successor will … Then again Dooley is reported to be widely despised within Viacom, maybe he’s going to be the hatchet man, with a short term and nothing to lose. Dauman got an $85 million dollar golden parachute after dropping Viacoms stock almost 50%, Dooley might have a nice retirement package coming his way as well …

Curious Cadet,

Re:Brad Grey is about to lose his job

People have been predicting that since day one of his hire, but this time I think you may be right.

This is some seriously bad mojo right here:

Stephen Chin’s ‘War Dogs’; TV content in Cuba; ‘Ben Hur’ flops big – The Frame – http://www.scpr.org/programs/the-frame/2016/08/22/14113/

Listen to the first story.

Filmmakers don’t want to take their films to Paramount because it’s unstable …

the kelvin timeline movies gave the franchise a boost overseas, especially with ‘sherlock’ in STID , but the series have never been a big seller worldwide

a $185 mil budget for STB cannot have helped this time.

i think wrapping mr elba in make up was a bad move. they could have sold the movie overseas with him.

It’s all over in the US. STB came in 11th, barely earning a million dollars on 2,000 screens! That’s pretty awful after only 4 weeks at the box office, and it’s still being beaten by FLORENCE FOSTER JENKINS which is on 500 fewer screens, yet earning a quarter of a million more.

Also, BEN HUR opened in 4th, so Paramount is hemoraging money right now. There’s a huge studio shakeup coming and Trek is not likely to be spared. It would be a whole other matter if Paramounts other films were doing well to help carry Trek, but they’re not.

We should know estimates from the South Korea opening by tomorrow, but it’s going to be tough to make a dent in this deficit.

And like many fans, you want it to fail.

Hugh Janus,

Re:you want it to fail

Bull, Cadet works in the industry and is merely giving us a realistic ana|ysis as opposed to to pie-in-the-sky.

And the number of people in the industry that are NOT STAR TREK fans and want Brad Grey to fail, far outstrip the Trek fans that wish him ill success.

@Curious Cadet,

Ben-Hur is the second movie by Paramount that tanked at the BO this summer after ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2’.

‘Beyond’ is not helping with its performance domestically & overseas. And it looks like Paramount is already getting nervous about budgets for future movies.

—————————————–

‘Mission: Impossible 6’ Halts Prep Until Tom Cruise And Others Deals Get Worked Out

Paramount Pictures has stopped the ticking clock and halted early pre-production of M:I6 Mission: Impossible. The studio won’t start up again until salary is worked out with franchise star Tom Cruise. The studio had hired between 15 to 20 people in London to start the soft prep work after writer/director Christopher McQuarrie and Cruise worked out the beats of the film, and McQuarrie went off to write the script. Those hired had just begun to work on the design of visual effects, and were told today to stop, we learned.

We’re hearing split versions for the reason: one scenario is that the studio is looking for Cruise and other producers including Bad Robot and Skydance to trim their fees. The other scenario is that Cruise wants Paramount to step up to the raise he got from Universal on The Mummy, and Paramount wants to pay him around what he got for the last film. So they’ve stopped the soft prep until they all find common ground…

All of this back and forth is understandable; several of this summer’s tent poles got maligned by high budgets. Mission: Impossible Rogue Nation grossed $682 million worldwide on a reported $150 million budget, which is the way to do it.

http://deadline.com/2016/08/mission-impossible-6-halts-prep-until-tom-cruise-and-others-deals-get-worked-out-1201806220/

Mission impossible also stars Tom Cruise. Not that I would want to see it, but if Tom Cruise played Kirk, STB might have made $682 million as well. STB will be lucky to clear $300 million.

You’ve got to wonder what kind of hold fee they’ve paid to Hemsworth, and what kind of arm twisting BR did to get them to agree to it considering this … I have to believe Paramount was clueless about STB, and thought they had a huge hit on their hands. If you don’t know anything about Trek, and comparing it to ST09 and STID, you’d probably think that STB was going to beat them both. And to be fair, they did a great job with it. The only thing they failed to deliver on was a dimensional villain and motive.

They did not create a “must-see” sense of anticipation with STB. My experience on opening day here in the UK was sitting down with my family in a cinema which was only 70% or so full. I was therefore not in the least bit surprised that in the UK and elsewhere it’s down on the previous 2 instalments. Perhaps the original teaser put a lot of folks off (in a bad first impression way) and the marketing campaign (which I thought was good) was too late in the day to build any momentum. Personally I enjoyed the beefed up character interactions but found Krall and his motives less than convincing or compelling and my reading of the audience reaction in the lobby afterwards was that the movie was “okay” but nothing to rave about. A shame really as they have a great cast with loads of potential and I hope they make more of them.

Looks like it only earned about $4 million in the US this weekend, and finished at 11th behind FFJ all three days. It appears to have earned about $10 million internationally, though they haven’t broken it down by territory yet. Not sure if that’s only from previously opened territories or if that includes the new territories as well. If the latter, that’s a very bad sign for the remaining territories.

‘Beyond’ opened in 2nd place in South Korea, and the 3rd in France and Spain.

The SK numbers are a bit higher than STID, France and Spain on the other hand came in lower than STID.

————————–
Deadline:

Beaming up notably in Korea, France and Spain, Paramount/Skydance’s latest in the franchise added $11.3M for an offshore total of $84.2M. The Star Trek Beyond crew was in Seoul on Tuesday for a screening and press conference which paid off with a No. 2 opening and $5.6M from 681 locations.

In France, the start was $2.1M in 3rd place; likewise Spain’s opening was No. 3 with $978K. Brazil, China, Mexico and Japan are still to come.

http://deadline.com/2016/08/suicide-squad-secret-life-of-pets-ben-hur-war-dogs-weekend-results-foreign-international-box-office-1201806587/

Interesting. STB also opened on about 80 more screens than STID did in SK. Still it earned almost 2 million more than STID. If that number holds, it might mean a 40% increase across the Asian box office, which still isn’t going to save it. Spain’s results don’t bode well for Central and South America though. I’m sure Paramount is sweating it out waiting for it to open in the rest of Asia and Central and South America though …

I wonder if this means Paramount will get this out on home video much faster? I was stunned how fast SW The Force Awakens came out — essentially 3 months after the movie was released — could Paramount release it faster than that? It doesn’t even premiere until around Halloween in Japan, so they probably couldn’t release it sooner.

The actuals are in. STB didn’t do very well in SK at all. It only earned about $300K more than STID and it was on about 100 more screens, for a total of 607 screens. The same in France, where it earned $1 million less than STID aside from being on the same number of screens.

Unless China earns 3x the STID box office, I can’t possibly see Paramount greenlighting another BR Trek film. Especially the one Abrams has in mind with two unproven writers, based on a story Paramount already rejected in favor of STB. The only way I can see it getting made is if CBS Films puts up half the money in order to get a “fix-the-timeline” movie made which restores Vulcan and Romulus, and all of the characters back to the way they were and leaves off the end of the film by introducing the Discovery. They might even get Shatner in there too.