'Seobok' to be released simultaneously on Tving, in theaters in April

A scene from the movie “Seobok” starring Park Bo-gum (CJ Entertainment)

A film about the first human clone “Seobok,” starring actors Gong Yoo and Park Bo-gum, will be released simultaneously on Korean streaming platform Tving and in theaters on April 15.

The upcoming film was initially set to be released in theaters last December but the film’s distributor CJ Entertainment had to delay the release due to COVID-19.

“Seobok” depicts the story of Ki-hun (Gong Yoo), an ex-intelligence agent, who receives a mission from the director of the intelligence agency (Cho Woo-jin), to move Seo-bok (Park Bo-gum) to a safe place.

Seo-bok is the first ever human clone and possesses the secret to eternal life. He was created and raised in a laboratory and has never known life outside of it.

The film is director Lee Yong-joo’s first work since “Architecture 101,” a hit romance movie that came out in 2012.

The distributor said that the decision for the simultaneous release was made to meet the audiences’ changing needs due to the spread of COVID-19.

“‘Seobok’ will be in theaters at the same time. This way, we can provide more choices to the audiences and also coexist with the theaters, which are struggling from a lack of newly released films,” CJ Entertainment said in a statement.

Tving is a streaming platform created under the wing of CJ Entertainment and was spun off from the entertainment conglomerate in October last year. The platform recently joined hands with broadcasting company JTBC and is currently Korea’s No. 3 streaming service provider, following Netflix and Wavve.

Meanwhile, starting with movie “Seobok” and entertainment show “Girls’ High School Mystery Class,” Tving said it will invest some 400 billion won ($357 million) into expanding original and exclusive content on the platform over the next three years.

By Song Seung-hyun (ssh@heraldcorp.com)

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