11/12/2003

The school holidays have proved to be a boon for cinemas, and have led to an increase in the average audience figures for 2003 in France, which have been generally disappointing. These are the main findings revealed by the statistics published by the National Film Centre – CNC. The figures also show that French production still faring well, with a market share of 37.3% of the audience since the start of the year.

November, which is traditionally a good month for cinema, has once again proved positive for cinema operators, distributors and producers. The audience figures reached 17 million, a rise of 13.1% in respect to November 2002. This has brought the 2003 audience figures to a total of 151.3 million, which is, however, still down 6.9% when compared with the first 11 eleven months of 2002. The audience figures for the last 12 month period are estimated to stand at 173.2 million, a drop of 7.2%.
However, the latest trends seem to show that there will be a further rise in audiences in December. In fact, from August the average audience figures have increased in respect to last year. And after a disastrous first six months (-12.3%), the 5 months covering July to November have been extremely positive (with an audience of 66.46 million in 2003, as opposed to 65.76 million in 2002).

As far as market share is concerned, the position of French films has remained stable (37.3% compared with 37.7% in 2002) thanks to the success of the trio Quentin and Ruby (almost 3 million tickets sold), Feelings (1.07 million) and Mauvais Esprit (1.08 million). In the meantime, American productions are still the market leader, standing at 53.2% (as opposed to the 49.8% in 2002), leaving productions from other countries behind, in spite of the incredible success of Good Bye Lenin! [+see also:
trailer
interview: Wolfgang Becker
film profile] (an audience of 1.24 million).

(Translated from French)