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BOX OFFICE France

A new annual admissions record in sight in France

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- French movie theatres have already drawn in 188.6 million viewers between January and the end of November, and are well on their way to a new annual record

A new annual admissions record in sight in France

Once again confounding the doomsayers who predict the death of the big screen and the advent of various forms of new, small-screen consumption of the seventh art, attendance levels in French movie theatres are in rude health, according to the estimates published by the CNC. Indeed, at the end of November (a month that saw 17.41 million admissions – up 0.5% on the same period in 2015), the running total since January 2016 stood at 188.69 million viewers, up by 4.2% compared to the first 11 months of last year. This trend suggests that we may witness a new annual record, as previously, the highest bar (since the CNC started collecting statistics) was set in 2014, with 209.1 million admissions, and December attendance levels for the last ten years have fluctuated between 17.6 and 25.3 million viewers (with more than 22 million for the past three years).

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As for market shares, French films currently stand at 36.2% in 2016, as against 51.6% for US productions and 12.1% for features from elsewhere in the world.

Amongst the recent standout titles at the box office, we should mention the Cannes Palme d’Or winner I, Daniel Blake [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by British director Ken Loach, which drew in almost 834,000 viewers over five weeks (distributed by Le Pacte). Another fine performance came from the Swiss-French animated film My Life as a Courgette [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Claude Barras
film profile
]
by Claude Barras, which has notched up 544,000 admissions in six weeks (Gebeka Distribution). Also of note are the 658,000 tickets sold in six weeks for From the Land of the Moon [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Nicole Garcia (StudioCanal), the 272,000 admissions racked up in five weeks by Heal the Living [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Katell Quillévéré
film profile
]
by Katell Quillévéré (Mars Distribution) and the 292,000 viewers in eight weeks for Heaven Will Wait [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Marie-Castille Mention-Schaar (UGC Distribution) – and that’s not to mention national comedies, with 1.15 million fans turning up over five weeks for La folle histoire de Max et Léon [+see also:
trailer
film profile
]
by Jonathan Barré (StudioCanal).

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(Translated from French)

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