13/11/2003

In 2002, the number of tickets sold in cinemas in the 18 western European countries has risen by 0.9% over last year, going from 958 to 966 million and confirming the positive trend of the past decade. Another figure that is rising, but more quickly, is the number of big screens: western Europe has seen a 35.6% increase between 1995 and 2002 (+6,3% between 2000 and 2002). On the contrary, the number of United States screens has decreased (-5% between 2000 and 2002). There is a wavering situation in European films that, outside of their country of origin, have surpassed the threshold of 10% of the audience only every other year, or in 1997, 1999, and in 2001.
These statistics are from the latest edition of the "European Cinema Yearbook - 2003 Advance Edition", published by MEDIA Salles, which will be presented Saturday in Taormina, at the “Meeting of experts on the reform of support tools for the European audiovisual industry", organized by the General Management for the Cinema, with the support of the European Commission.
The study, which will be introduced by Joachim Ph. Wolff, Vice President of MEDIA Salles, also indicates an increase of multiplexesin both western and eastern Europe: in the 32 European countries analyzed between January 2002 and January 2003, this type of cinema increased by 12%, reaching a total number of 836 complexes.