22/06/2016 - The 25th edition of the conference is taking place in Barcelona for the fifth time, bringing together exhibitors and distributors while also promoting European cinema and its innovations

Since Monday (and running until tomorrow, Thursday), CineEurope, an unmissable and increasingly well-attended rendezvous for the European film industry, has been celebrating its silver anniversary in Barcelona. On the opening day, Phil Clapp, president of UNIC (the International Union of Cinemas), highlighted the fruitful relationship between European exhibitors and distributors, which enabled 2015 to become a record year in terms of box-office takings for titles hailing from Europe, thus underlining their growth and their sheer cultural and thematic variety, with 770 million people flocking to theatres to enjoy the spectacle of the big screen on the continent.

He also referred to the booming Asian markets, but nevertheless “Europe accounts for almost one-quarter of global takings”. In addition, he encouraged those present not to neglect the younger generations’ new ways of consuming audiovisual content and the fight against piracy, which accounts for 15% of the box office. Among the figures provided by UNIC, it is worth pointing out that, in 2015, 95% of its 38,600 theatres – spread across 36 member countries – were already digitised, there are on average 50 theatres per one million inhabitants (but here, Norway really stands out, with 87) and, while US films continue to dominate the box office, 6% more tickets were sold – at an average price of €6.60 – than in 2014.

Besides stands showing off the sector’s technological innovations, round-tables and screenings of movies due to land in theatres shortly, tomorrow CineEurope 2016 will crown Christian Langhammer – the founder of Cineplexx International GmbH, which owns cinemas in Eastern Europe – as International Exhibitor of the Year, and Rodolphe Buet – president of distribution and marketing at StudioCanal – as International Distributor of the Year. Meanwhile, production outfit Nordisk Film A/S (A War [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Tobias Lindholm
film profile], Land of Mine [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Louis Hofmann
interview: Martin Zandvliet
film profile]) will be given the Independent Film Award, and the UNIC Honorary Award will go to Nico Simon, president of Europa Cinemas and co-founder of Utopolis Cinemas Group.

(Translated from Spanish)