Dystopian film set in Seoul ‘Badland Hunters’ reaches Netflix No. 1

 

The Netflix original film “Badland Hunters” became the most-watched movie in both the English and non-English categories on Wednesday, continuing its two-week streak as one of the streaming platform’s top 10 non-English movies since its release on Jan. 26.

The dystopian action film is Heo Myung-haeng’s directorial debut.

The story follows hardened remnants played by Don Lee, Lee Hee-joon, Lee Jun-young and Roh Jeong-eui along their survival in a post-apocalyptic Seoul, a wasteland following a catastrophic earthquake.

Don Lee plays Namsan, a “hunter” who navigates the wasteland to scavenge for resources to keep life afloat in his village.

The movie has been viewed 18.1 million times between Jan. 29 to Feb. 4, according to Netflix. The amount was calculated by dividing the total hours viewed, 32.9 million hours, by the film’s runtime of one hour and 49 minutes.

It beat the documentary “The Greatest Night in Pop” and the animated film “Orion and the Dark” in the English film category, which had 11.9 million and 10 million views, respectively.

In the non-English category, Spanish thriller “Society of the Snow,” with 6.9 million views, and Indian crime epic “Animal,” with 5.5 million, trailed after the Korean dystopian action movie.

“Badland Hunters,” which became the No. 1 non-English film on Netflix three days after its release, has remained in the top spot for two weeks. It places among the top 10 films in 89 countries as of Wednesday.

“I am very grateful for the positive attention the action film has received,” actor Don Lee said on the movie’s popularity. “I hope to continue to show off Korean action [content].”

BY KIM JU-YEON [kim.juyeon2@joongang.co.kr]