Korean leisure powerhouse CJ ENM continues to make vital strides on the worldwide stage following its trio of nominations on the Banff Rockie Awards 2025, which additional cement its place as a worldwide content material juggernaut.
The Banff World Media Festival has named Korea as its inaugural Country of Honor for the 2025 version.
Constructing on the momentum created by its historic success with Bong Joon Ho’s “Parasite,” which gained 4 Oscars in 2020, CJ ENM is now making its mark within the tv house.
“CJ ENM is honored to be nominated at Banff Rockie Awards 2025. We’re proud that Korean content material is getting recognition within the international stage and CJ ENM to steer the trail as the one Asia-based firm to safe triple nominations,” Hyo-ju Jeon, the corporate’s head of worldwide advertising and marketing, tells Selection.
The corporate’s nominated titles showcase its quickly diversifying content material portfolio, with interval drama “Jeongnyeon: The Star is Born” (obtainable globally by way of Disney+) competing within the Restricted Sequence class, black comedy “LTNS” vying for Comedy Sequence: Non-English Language honors, and way of life program “Europe Exterior Your Tent: France” rounding out the nominations.
Set towards the backdrop of Nineteen Fifties Korea, “Jeongnyeon: The Star is Born” follows a gifted vocalist on her journey to change into the premier performer of gukgeuk (Korean feminine classical opera). “I imagine this excellent story of oriental feminine narrative of development deserves recognition past the native borders and I’m delighted to witness it earn success on the worldwide stage,” Jeon notes concerning the interval piece.
In the meantime, “LTNS” (an abbreviation for “Lengthy Time No Intercourse”) takes a darkly comedic strategy to the story of a sexless married couple who start blackmailing adulterers for monetary achieve. Jeon highlights the present’s distinctive attraction: “The mix of humor and an intriguing storyline, dropped at life by Okay-content consultants, captivates international audiences. Because the plot unfolds, the unraveling of hidden truths retains viewers anticipating what comes subsequent.”
Finishing the trio, “Europe Exterior the Tent: France” follows 4 distinguished Korean actresses on what Jeon describes as “a hyper-real but therapeutic tenting journey to Southern France,” including that “watching A-list Korean actresses embrace their freedom amidst breathtaking landscapes made the present actually price watching.”
The nominations adopted CJ ENM’s breakout 2024, which noticed the corporate rating within the international romantic comedy house with hits like “Queen of Tears,” “Pretty Runner,” and “Marry My Husband,” every discovering substantial worldwide viewers success.
Nevertheless, the corporate has been strategically increasing past its rom-com stronghold. “CJ ENM has been working to broaden its portfolio understanding the significance of style range. Banff Rockie Awards nominees from CJ ENM spotlight that now we have been strategically diversifying the content material choices to attraction to a broader vary of audiences globally, not resting on our laurels with romantic comedies,” Jeon explains.
The corporate just lately scored one other worldwide hit with motion comedy “Examine Group,” additional validating its style diversification technique. “CJ ENM takes nice satisfaction in seeing a wider vary of genres being acknowledged within the international leisure business. We imagine that ‘untold originals’ evoke real emotion that everybody craves,” provides Jeon.
Past content material diversification, CJ ENM has been aggressively pursuing new worldwide markets, with explicit success in Latin America. The corporate has solid partnerships with main regional broadcasters, together with Televisa, which has aired Korean reveals like “True Magnificence” on its linear channels, and Imagen TV, which made historical past by airing Korean drama “One other Miss Oh” for the primary time in Mexico.
“True Magnificence” has been a specific success story, changing into one among Televisa’s Channel 5’s most-watched packages, attracting between 700,000 and 1.1 million viewers in its 6:30pm slot — a efficiency that exceeded all expectations.
CJ ENM measures its worldwide success by varied metrics past awards and viewership numbers, together with associate platform rankings, further content material acquisition by companions, and the elevated international recognition of actors as measured by social media development. The corporate additionally locations vital emphasis on viewers’ qualitative evaluations.
Trying forward, Jeon affirms the corporate’s dedication to worldwide development: “We’re dedicated to striving for excellence on the Banff Rockie Awards and can proceed to steer Okay-content on the worldwide stage, together with at worldwide award ceremonies.”
