Best-picture winner 'Parasite' dominated the Oscars and is also a box-office hit
- The South Korean dark comedy "Parasite," the first non-English-language movie to win the best picture Oscar, is also a box-office hit.
- The movie has made $35 million in the US and $165 million worldwide off of a small budget.
- It had the highest per-screen average for a US debut of 2019, when it earned $376,264 on just a few screens.
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"Parasite" became the first non-English-language movie to win best picture at the Oscars on Sunday and it's also been a triumph at the box office.
The South Korean dark comedy, directed by Bong Joon-ho, has made $35 million in the US and $165 million worldwide off of a small budget. It made $72 million in South Korea.
Joon-ho told The Atlantic in October that the budget was "around a fifth" of the budget for his Netflix movie, "Okja," which cost $50 million to produce, according to IMDb Pro. That would make "Parsite's" budget around $10 million.
"I love this scale and budget," he said of "Parasite." "That's the reason my next two projects - one is Korean language and one is English language - both are relatively small, like this one."
"Parasite" earned $376,264 on just a few screens when it debuted in the US in October, with a per-screen average of $125,421 - the highest of 2019.
Neon, the movie's distributor, has steadily rolled the movie out to hundreds of locations since. It gave it its most significant expansion yet to 1,060 locations after the Oscar nominations were announced last month, according to Comscore.
"Parasite" is a hit with not only the Oscars and audiences, but critics, too. It has a 99% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes.
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