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Train to Busan

2016 film by Yeon Sang-ho

Manuscripts, fine bindings, an engraving plate and preserved performance ephemera
Arts and lettersInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 17, 2026
Entity authorityQ20948236 ↗
Source-derived summary

Train to Busan (Korean: 부산행) is a 2016 South Korean action horror film directed by Yeon Sang-ho and written by Park Joo-suk. It stars Gong Yoo, Jung Yu-mi, Ma Dong-seok, Kim Su-an, Choi Woo-shik, Ahn So-hee, and Kim Eui-sung. The film takes place primarily on a KTX from Seoul to Busan as a zombie apocalypse suddenly breaks out and threatens the safety of the passengers.

A co-production between Next Entertainment World and RedPeter Film, Train to Busan premiered in the Midnight Screenings section of the 2016 Cannes Film Festival on May 13. It was released by Next Entertainment World on July 20 in South Korea; by August 7, it became the first Korean film of the year to break the audience record of over 10 million theatergoers. It received positive reviews and was a commercial success, grossing $98.5 million on a budget of $8.5 million.

The film spawned the Train to Busan series, and was followed by the animated prequel Seoul Station (2016) and the standalone sequel Peninsula (2020).

Plot

A deer is hit by a truck and reanimates after the truck leaves. Seok-woo, a cynical workaholic and divorced father in Seoul, messes up a birthday present for his estranged daughter Su-an, and missed out on her recital of the Hawaiian folk song "Aloha ʻOe". He agrees with Su-an to take her to see her mother, Na-young, in Busan.

Editorial summary

“Train to Busan” enters the record as 2016 film by Yeon Sang-ho. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Train, Busan and film can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA useful identification and reception guide that helps separate the work itself from editions, performances, ownership and later interpretation. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—2016, 2020—that can be checked directly. The authority record carries competing date values—2016-05-13, 2016-07-20, 2016-07-22, 2016-11-24—which should remain separate until their references and qualifiers are resolved. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Train, Busan and film.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Train to Busan” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Train, Busan and film provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 17, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q20948236. 2 of 9 selected statements include explicit references; 8 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2016 and 2020.

Critical limits

Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.

Best used for
  • Identifying works and editions
  • Tracing reception history
  • Finding collection records
Verify next

The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Train to Busan”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Train to Busan primary sources, Train to Busan archive and Train research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Train to Busan”?
  2. How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
  3. Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Train to Busan” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.