European Box Office Revenue Rises (Barely) Despite Softer Admissions
Cinema admissions across Europe fell in 2024 despite a slight rise in overall box office revenue, according to the International Union of Cinemas' (UNIC) 2025 annual report, released during the CineEurope convention in Barcelona on Tuesday.
Total admissions across the 39 European territories represented by UNIC reached 934.2 million in 2024, down 2.6 percent from the previous year. Box office revenue, at €7.1 billion ($8.2 billion), was up by the slimmest of margins, increasing 0.03 percent. The UNIC report cited 'the lingering effects of the 2023 actors' and writers' strikes' as one of the main reasons for the sluggish performance.
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Several European markets did record year-on-year growth, however, including France, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Poland, Lithuania, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Greece. France led the region with 181.5 million admissions, boosted by the performance of domestic hits A Little Something Extra, The Count of Monte-Cristo, and Beating Hearts, which together sold more than 25 million tickets.
Disney's Inside Out 2, which grossed more than $1 billion worldwide, was Europe's top performer of 2024, setting new records for an animated film in Spain and Italy, and significantly driving theatrical admissions in Germany, the Netherlands, and Turkey, the report found. The Kelsey Mann-directed sequel topped the box office charts in most European territories last year, but there were a few exceptions. In France, A Little Something Extra and The Count of Monte-Cristo — the only two European titles to sell more than 10 million tickets across the region last year — pushed Inside Out 2 into the number 3 slot, and in Latvia, home-grown animation champ, the Oscar-winner Flow, outsold the Pixar blockbuster.
'The 2025 UNIC Annual Report makes abundantly clear that, despite the challenges it faced during the year, the European cinema sector continues to show strength and resilience, underpinned of course, by our audience's desire to see films in their natural home, on the big screen,' said UNIC president Phil Clapp. 'I look forward to seeing that positive story develop further as the film slate continues to strengthen across the end of the year and into 2026.'
European films claimed 32.8 percent of the EU market in 2024, up from 27.7 percent in 2023, reinforcing the sector's dependence on national productions. France reached a 44.8 percent local market share, one of its highest on record. Finland's national titles accounted for 30.4 percent of the market, the highest since 2017. Bulgaria reported a local share of 24.4 percent, triple its 2023 figure, driven by Gundi: Legend of Love, a biopic of footballer Georgi Asparuhov.
The UNIC report highlighted a strong start to 2025 with blockbuster returns for A Minecraft Movie, Lilo & Stitch, and Sinners, as well as European features such as Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, and Paddington in Peru. Promising releases set for the second half of the year include sequels Jurassic World: Rebirth, Wicked: For Good, Zootopia 2, and Avatar: Fire and Ash.
In its April 2025 forecast, theatrical analysts Gower Street raised its global box office projection for the year to $34.1 billion, up from $33.0 billion forecasted in December 2024.
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