CJ Entertainment

Background
CJ Entertainment (CJ 엔터테인먼트) is a South Korean film and television company that acquires, produces and distributes over 3,000 titles for the Korean market and the world, and a branch of Korean food company CJ Corporation. Being South Korea's largest entertainment company, it played an important role in the rise of the South Korean film industry. The success of their own films after the 2000 film Chunhyang, most notably Joint Security Area that broke the Korean box office records previously set by Shiri, helped the company in becoming one of the two largest film companies in the country along with Kang Woo-suk's Cinema Service.

The company previously held Korean distribution arrangements with DreamWorks Pictures (including its spun-off animation unit) and Paramount Pictures. The DreamWorks arrangement would last until 2006 when the studio was purchased by Paramount's parent company, Viacom (this led to a few DreamWorks titles being distributed through UIP's Korean branch until 2007) while the Paramount arrangement lasted until 2015 when Lotte took over distribution of Paramount titles in Korea and the DWA arrangement would last until 2018 when Universal's Korean branch would take over distribution rights of DWA titles in that region from CJ due to Universal's purchase of DWA being completed three years prior.

1st Logo (2001-2003)
pDxQ49fxAnU

Logo: We see the starfield with a comet flying across. Suddenly all stars fold into a glowing orange bundle, which then moves and spreads them out. The stars form the 3D blue name "CJ ENTERTAINMENT" seen in perspective, while the bundle goes to the far end and freezes there. The red dot flies over the logo and colors it into gold, stopping above the bundle and coloring it red.

Variant: Some films like Symphathy For Mr. Vengeance have the plain colored logo in an in-credit fashion.

FX/SFX: Nice CGI.

Music/Sounds: A synthesized woodwind and bell theme.

Availability: Uncommon. Can be seen on the early films by the company, such as The Way Home and Memories Of Murder.

Editor's Note: None.

2nd Logo (2003- )
Logo: We start at a night sea landscape, colored in deep blue. 3 Children jump around and play with fireworks on a rocky peninsula. 3 colored splashes blast from their fireworks and proceed up, while the camera follows them, then stops and lets the splashes to pass on. We then have a view from below, watching these splashes reaching the sky and exploding there, forming three oval figures - red, blue and orange. The logo name poses around it and glows. The background clears out.

Variant: Starting in 2011, the text is now in the corporate font, all capitalized, and a byline appears in the same font saying "A CJ E&M CORPORATION COMPANY". Since 2018, the byline now reads "A CJ ENM CORPORATION COMPANY" due to the parents' rebranding.

FX/SFX: An amazing combination of CGI and live-action.

Music/Sounds: A short string entry as the children giggle and the fireworks pop, progressing into a massively beautiful, rising orchestral tune. We then hear some fireworks sparkle, followed by another string note and a 5-note chime sounder. The rising part of the theme is actually a piece of production music from EastWest's "Scoring Tools" sample CD, used in many cartoons, Nine Network's 2001 "Still the One" campaign, and Tyne Tees Television's "Millennium" ident.

Music/Sounds Variant: A few films, such as Parasite, have part of the opening theme from the film.

Availability: Common on Korean releases, which can be on sale worldwide, such as Sophie's Revenge, A Man Who Was Superman and I'm a Cyborg but That's OK. For original Korean distributions it is usually replaced with its local publisher, but some films directly produced by CJ retain the logo. On English versions of their output, the logo is either intact or is replaced by the English distributor's logo. This logo was also used on Korean prints of DreamWorks Animation titles released from 2004 to 2017 (from 2013 to 2017 the logo plastered the Fox logo on Korean prints of DreamWorks titles Fox distributed due to CJ keeping Korean distribution rights to DWA's catalog). In 2018, this logo would be replaced with the Universal logo (due to Universal's acquisition of DWA being completed in 2016) on titles when CJ previously distirbuted.

Editor's Note: None.