After a record year, Norwegian films lose almost 60% of their audience

by Jorn Rossing Jensen

25/07/2012 - Fewer local releases and no real blockbusters will be substantially compensated by a strong autumn season, according to the Norwegian Film Institute

Norwegian audiences let down local cinemas during the first half of 2012: admissions for Norwegian productions were reduced by 59.3%, according to statistics from Norwegian cinema association, Film & Kino. Last year, Norway registered Europe’s largest growth of the theatrical market, with a 24.5% domestic share (2.9 million tickets).

“2011 was an extraordinary year, with a record number of local releases – 20 during the first six months against 14 this year,” said Film & Kino Head of Communications Birgitte Langballe. “We will not see that very often – I think we are now back to normal.”

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While the best Norwegian performer between January 1-June 30, 2011, Anne Sewitsky’s Totally True Love [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (photo), sold 170,994 tickets, this year’s No 1, Stian Kristensen’s The Orheim Company [+see also:
trailer
film profile] reached 76,057. However, head of production Ivar Køhn, of the Norwegian Film Institute, expected local fare to substantially make up for the result in the months to come.

“Producers and distributors prefer to launch their top titles in the autumn, so the repertoire till now has been small – only one feature with institute production funding has come out so far, and we have missed a few of the popular children’s films,” he explained.

On August 14, at Oslo’s Film House, the institute will introduce the autumn season with another 14 new Norwegian productions – among the titles Køhn will rely on are Espen Sandberg and Joachim Rønning’s action-adventure Kon-Tiki [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile], Roar Uthaug’s period actioner The Escape and Nils Gaup’s family fantasy, The Journey to the Christmas Star.

This year’s best-performing local titles - besides Company Orheim - include Trond Espen Seim’s Varg Veum: Cold Hearts with 66,438, Erik Richter Strand’s Varg Veum: The Dead Have It Easy, 60,089, Petter Næss’s Into the White [+see also:
trailer
film profile], 42,947, and Øystein Karlsen’s Fuck Up, 42,947.