The Host (2006): trivia & fun facts

Fun facts

• The 2.63 million admissions and US$17.2 million box office revenue decisively beat the previous records set by Typhoon (2005).
• The following month, Variety reported that principal photography on the film was set to begin later that year on a budget of around $12 million.
• The film ultimately had a budget of ₩11 billion (roughly $11 million in 2006), making it very costly by Korean industry standards.
• Bong and Ha Joon-won started scripting The Host that same year; Baek Chul-hyun joined the pair for revision in December 2004.
• In June 2005, it was confirmed that Song, Byun, Park Hae-il, and Bae would star in the film, all of whom except Bae had worked with Bong on Memories of Murder.
• Bong took inspiration from the Japanese films Godzilla and Seven Samurai (both 1954) for setting the film's tone and rainy climax, respectively.
• On July 27, 2006, it was released on 620 theater screens in South Korea, a record number in the country at that time.
• In November 2009, Twitch Film revealed that the screenplay was being reworked with a simultaneous video game adaptation, planned as a multi-platform first-person shooter.
• Principal photography was expected to begin in 2015 under Park's direction as a Chinese-Korean co-production, with an intended 2016 release date.
• In 2019, Cine21 declared that, despite rumors from 2016 indicating that principal photography had occurred, The Host 2 had been canceled.
• Of the film's $11 million budget, $4.5 million was spent on the over 100 visual effect shots.
• An unfinished cut of The Host debuted at the 59th Cannes Film Festival on May 21, 2006, as part of the Directors' Fortnight.
• The film reached six million viewers on August 6, 2006, and by the end of its nine-week run in South Korea, the film had grossed more than $90 million, while the number of viewers reached 13,019,740.
• According to Chungeorahm Film's March 2007 theatrical profit estimate, the film had earned $97 million.
• In IndieWire's 2007 critics poll, it placed 17th on their Best Film list based on 19 mentions; Bong also tied for 16th on the Best Director list.

Source: Wikipedia

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