For the first time since 1989, a French film was not included in the top 10 box office results in a country dominated exclusively by U.S. studio films.
James Cameron’s “Avatar: Path of Water” has earned an estimated gross of $54 million from 7.8 million attendees since its release on December 14, leading the charts in 2022 and becoming the “Top Gun : Maverick”, “Minions: Rise of Gru”, “Jurassic World Dominion”, “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”, “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness”, “The Batman”, “Thor: Love and Thunder, Spider-Man: No Way Home, Fantastic Beasts: Dumbledore’s Secret.”
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But even these blockbusters failed to bring the French box office back to pre-pandemic levels. In 2019, it was down 28%.
Ticket sales in 2022 will reach 152 million, a 60% year-on-year increase, as theaters will be closed for more than five months in 2021. According to Comscore France, the French box office has been affected by several factors, including the threat of COVID variants. , the rescheduling of several releases slated for the first few months of 2022, as well as a handful of U.S. films to be released in the summer.
The highest-grossing French film, Serial (Bad) Weddings 3, sold 2.4 million tickets, making it the 12th highest-grossing release of the year. “Serial (Bad) Weddings 3,” the third installment in the UGC-produced comedy franchise, underperformed significantly compared to his previous two entries. The first movie released in 2014 sold over 12.4 million admissions for him and the second earned him 7 million tickets. The franchise revolves around the Verneuil family, an upper-class, xenophobic French Catholic couple (Christian Clavier, Chantal Robie), whose daughters are men of different faiths and ethnic backgrounds. am married to
Comscore France’s Eric Marti said: Marti talks about his big comedies, which were expected to be his highest-grossing local titles last year, including “Serial (Bad) Weddings,” “Super-heromal grélui,” and “Ducobu President!” It didn’t live up to my expectations.
Citing Cedric Jiménez’s “November,” a counter-terrorism thriller set in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in Paris, Martí said, “People seem to be tired of cookie-cutter comedies, and audiences are looking for more original films.” They seem to want different kinds of stories,” he said. 2015 with Jean Dujardin. The Studiocanal film was ranked as the second highest-grossing local film, grossing $2.3 million.
The third biggest local-language hit is Simone, a Warner Bros. production in France about an Auschwitz survivor who became France’s health minister and defended the 1975 law that legalized abortion in France. It was Bale’s biopic Simone: Woman of the Century.
2022 did little at the box office in France, but it did include Louis Garrel’s romantic crime comedy The Innocent, Dominique Mohr’s thought-provoking thriller La Nuit du 12, and Cedric Klapisch’s Reinforcements. Several global film titles have also achieved success. Notably Tariq Saleh’s “Cairo His Conspiracy” represented Sweden in his Oscar race and is the biggest (non-English) foreign-language hit in France since Juno’s “Parasite”.
Paradoxically, last year’s French box office was dominated by US films, but market share fell slightly as fewer US films were released. The average box office per release in the US rose last year. According to Comscore, the French film’s market share was about the same as in 2021, despite a higher number of local his releases.
In addition to audience fatigue and release timing, Marti says some French films suffer from being delivered to too many screens. “Many French distributors have released films on 300 screens, often with half-empty theaters. increase. In contrast, US studios opted for a more contained release plan. For example, Paramount’s 250 screen release of “Smile” sold out movie theaters and sold over 1.2 million tickets.
Looking ahead, the French box office could pick up in the first half of 2023, fueled by the expected tide of major local-language titles. For example, Gaumont’s “Fathers and Soldiers” starring Omar Sy and Pathé’s “The Three Musketeers: D.” “Artagnan” and “Asterix and Obelix: The Middle Kingdom”.
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