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| Photo: Plain Archive |
[Sports Today reporter Jeong Ye-won] The film The Man Who Lives with the King (directed by Jang Hang-jun, distributed by Showbox) has surpassed 15 million cumulative admissions to become the highest-grossing Korean film in history, and its momentum is now spilling over into the publishing world. Ranked third on the all-time box-office list after The Admiral: Roaring Currents and Extreme Job, the film has remained at the top of the box office for eight weeks, continually setting new records.
Plain Archive’s screenplay book for The Man Who Lives with the King climbed to No. 1 on Yes24’s overall bestseller list on the 25th—just three days after preorder sales began and ahead of the official release. It simultaneously entered the overall bestseller charts at No. 2 on both Aladin and Kyobo Bookstore’s online stores. Based on preorder demand alone, the publisher has already moved to a fourth printing, an unusually strong showing for the book market driven by the film’s blockbuster success.
Set in Cheongnyeongpo in 1457, The Man Who Lives with the King follows a village chief who volunteers for exile to revive his hometown and a young deposed king sent into exile. Since its Lunar New Year release, the film has drawn broad, cross-generational sympathy and has become the most-attended Korean film since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The screenplay book, co-authored by writer Hwang Seong-gu and director Jang Hang-jun, presents the complete script. It includes lines and scenes that differ slightly from the finished film and records characters’ expressions and inner thoughts—details that briefly passed across the screen through the actors’ performances—giving viewers who saw the movie a fresh and deeper emotional experience.
Beyond the full script, the volume features new forewords written by both authors, a shot-by-shot storyboard of the tearful final sequence, and congratulatory signatures and messages from 12 cast and crew members, including the director—all compiled in a single edition.
Special care went into the book’s design. Modeled on the on-set script book used during filming, the publisher reimagined traditional motifs to give the volume its own texture. The cover uses an old-style typeface and paper that evokes hanji, lending an antique-book atmosphere. Following the storyboard section, a fold-out page reproduces the Joseon-era landscape painting Cheongnyeongpodo—which depicts the exile site of Danjong—so readers can feel the lingering presence of the story’s real-world setting on the page.
The emotion that began on screen continues in print—tears shed in theaters reappear on the page. The screenplay book for The Man Who Lives with the King is the most definitive edition of a story shared by more than 15 million viewers.
[Sports Today reporter Jeong Ye-won ent@stoo.com]
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