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INDUSTRY / MARKET France

French films grossed €250.2 million in cinemas worldwide in 2024

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- Amidst enduringly unstable cinema attendance figures, the circulation of French films in cinemas around the world fell by 11% last year, with 38.1 million admissions

French films grossed €250.2 million in cinemas worldwide in 2024
The Count of Monte-Cristo by Alexandre de La Patellière and Matthieu Delaporte

Cinema attendance in France might have regained a bit of colour over the long, post-pandemic recovery period (read our news), but this isn’t yet the case in a number of foreign markets which saw the 2023 American strikes impacting the films ultimately proposed in the first semester of 2024. It was a global issue which checked the progressive recovery of French films’ foreign circulation (17.8 million admissions in 2021, 31.3 in 2022 and 42.7 in 2023), with French films earning €250.2m in cinemas around the world in 2024 (through 38.1 million admissions), according to the provisional numbers unveiled today, during the fifth Export Day which is preceding the 27th Unifrance Rendez-Vous (unspooling in Paris between 14 and 21 January – see the news).

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The five French films which performed best around the world last year are spearheaded by The Count of Monte-Cristo [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile
]
by Alexandre de La Patellière and Matthieu Delaporte (3.3 million admissions, with €20.7m earned across releases in 54 regions), which outstripped Justine Triet’s Palme d’Or winner Anatomy of a Fall [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Justine Triet
film profile
]
(3.2 million admissions across 52 regions in 2024 after boasting 1.7m admissions in 2023, making it last year’s most successful French film outside of Europe). Stealing focus on the 3rd step of the podium is Autumn and the Black Jaguar by Gilles de Maistre (2.4 million admission across 28 regions), followed by The Taste of Things [+see also:
film review
film profile
]
by Tran Anh Hung (1.4m admissions in 41 regions) and the animated movie The Jungle Bunch: World Tour by Laurent Bru and Yannick Moulin (1 million admissions in 48 regions).

French-language productions very largely dominated the 37.4 million admissions recorded by French cinema around the world last year, accounting for 74.7% of tickets sold.

In terms of admissions broken down by genres, the market share for dramas was 26.1% (enjoying a strong revival outside of Europe), while comedies boasted 21.8% (though key European markets proved less interested than in previous years), action and adventure films 21.3%, animations 17.7%, fantasy films, horror and sci-fi 5%, biopics and historical works 3.7%, detective movies and thrillers 3.1%, and documentaries 1.4%.

For the 9th consecutive year, Western Europe was the leading region for French films, accounting for 42.8% (with 14.3 million viewers) of international admissions recorded last year. Germany remains the most favourable foreign country to French cinema, accounting for 4.1 million admissions, with five other Western European countries also featuring in 2024’s 10 most receptive regions (the Belgium-Luxembourg zone with 4.1 million admissions, Italy with 2 million, Spain with 1.7 million and Switzerland with 1 million).

Central and Eastern Europe was the second most welcoming region for French films, accounting for 24.6% (8.2 million viewers) of foreign admissions in 2024, with Russia (3.7 million admissions) and Poland (2 million) proving especially crucial bastions.

A sharp rise was noted in Latin America, which now dominates 14.4% of the market (with 4.8 million admissions and Mexico spearheading the region with 2.6 million), followed by Asia with 8.6% (2.9 million admissions despite growth in China to 1.5 million tickets sold), the USA-Canada zone with 6.4% (2.1 million admissions), the Africa & Near and Middle East region (0.5%) and Africa (0.2%).

Whilst Europe remains the most receptive region to French film, accounting for 67.5% of 2024 admissions abroad, the situation does seem to have levelled out a little following a peak in 2023 (77.5% of admissions), even if Europe’s share in the market is still way above its 2010-2019 average of 47.7%.

It is important, however, that we put all of these figures on the broadcasting of French films in cinemas around the world into perspective with the latter’s solid presence on SVoD platforms. Ultimately, France ranked 5th in terms of the numbers of films and series released on SVoD platforms around the world last year (accounting for 3.8% of the overall total, behind the USA who accounted for 52.3% of these international releases, followed by the UK, Japan and India).

(Translated from French)

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