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BOX OFFICE Switzerland

Swiss films claim 4% market share in 2008

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Before the 2008 Swiss box office results are announced, the Federal Office for Culture has released its estimates for Swiss film.

In comparison with the record figures of 2006 (market share of over 9%), this year’s 4% almost pales into insignificance. Yet it nevertheless amounts to a respectable average given the absence of major hits.

On the other hand, audiences’ interest in Swiss films has been confirmed, with 14 titles attracting over 10,000 viewers each. For the whole of Switzerland, audience figures for domestic films are estimated at 400,000.

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The most surprising results come from French-speaking Switzerland, where audience figures have risen sharply. At 140,000 admissions, we’re approaching the scores achieved in the 1990s by Alain Tanner’s and Claude Goretta’s films of the New Swiss Cinema movement.

Ursula Meier’s Home [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Kacey Mottet Klein
interview: Thierry Spicher
interview: Ursula Meier
film profile
]
(41,000 viewers so far in French-speaking Switzerland alone) and Micha Lewinsky’s The Friend [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
(30,000 admissions) stand out among the narrative features, while Hans Haldimann’s bucolic Bergab, Begerauf (45,000 viewers) shines in the documentary genre.

While audience figures in Switzerland remain generally stable (15-16m viewers since 1995), the continual increase in new productions (from 351 in 2000 to over 500 in 2008) on Swiss screens and the growing number of theatres (from 500 in 2000 to 570 in 2008) lead to greater competition between films.

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(Translated from French)

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