13-02-2011

Cinema Admissions Rise Across CEE

By FNE Staff

    Cinema admissions showed significant increases in several Central and East European countries in 2010, outperforming European territories overall. The most notable results were registered in Romania, Bulgaria, Estonia, and Turkey. A new report issued by the European Audiovisual Observatory noted a 2% drop in admissions for the European Union, to a total of 961 million. By contrast, Turkey had an 11.3% increase, to 41.3 million; Estonia rose by 19.7%, to 2.1 million; Bulgaria grew by 27.3%, to 3.9 million thanks in large part to the hit domestic film Mission London; and Romania saw a 28.8% rise, to 6.8 million, with local films drawing large audiences for the first time.

    Turkish films claimed over half of all tickets sold in Turkey, as audiences continued to support national films, with a market share of 52.9% in 2010, and 50.9% in 2009.

    Also showing strong growth were the Czech Republic, up 8.6% to 13.5 million; and Latvia, up 8.3% to 2.1 million. Hungary had a 3.1% bump with 10.9 million admissions; and Slovenia showed a rise of 1.7% at 2.8 million.

    Lithuania, Poland, and Slovakia registered drops in admiaaions. Lithuanian attendance fell 2.9% to 2.6 million, while box office fell by 7.3% to LTL 34 million. Polish attendance decreased by 4.3%, and saw the national market share cut almost in half, but rising ticket prices kept the box office climb by 3.2% to PLN 703 million. Slovak admissions fell by 5.6% to 3.9 million, and with a temporary drop in local film production due to a restructure of the funding system, the national market share fell to just one quarter of the 2009 results. However, box Slovak box office showed a healthy 6.5% increase.

    Croatia had a 6.5% drop in admissions, at 3.3 million, but a 3.8% rise in box office, at HRK 87.6 million.

    Czech films again proved popular on the local market, claiming a 34.8% share of the CZK1,497 million box office.

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