THE EXIBITION OF EUROPEAN FILMS REVISITED

THE EXHIBITION OF EUROPEAN FILMS REVISITED
by Dr. Joachim Ph. Wolff - 1999

Remarkable developments

Probably many of the younger persons working within the film industry will think it almost unbelievable, but after an almost continuous decline from the end of the forties on, admissions to US films in West Europe reached an unprecedented nadir in 1973. In France, a country with a strong feature film production, the total market share of all US films was 19.8% in that year, whilst in a country with only a small national production like the Netherlands, it was not more than 30.5%.

After this low point market shares of US films increased, also almost continuously, to the high levels we have now. From the early eighties on admissions decreased considerably in West Europe. This went on until about 1990, whereafter admissions were rising again, be it in a modest way.

Quite remarkable is, that the sharp decrease of admissions was caused almost solely by the diminishing successes of European films, especially outside their countries of origin, whilst admissions to US films remained more or less stable. This is shown in Table 1.

Table 1 Indices of total admissions, resp. admissions to US films (1983 = 100)

	France		the Netherlands		Denmark
	total admissions	Admissions to US films	total admissions	admissions to US films	total admissions	admissions to US films
1983	100	100	100	100	100	100
1984	96	102	82	96	86	.
1985	88	99	76	110	82	90
1986	85	105	74	112	83	95
1987	69	86	77	95	83	87
1988	63	82	74	110	72	82
1989	61	97	78	113	75	88
1990	62	101	73	119	70	97

_{Source:
M. Gyory and G. Glas, "Statistics of the Film Industry in Europe" (the
European Centre for Research and Information on Films and Television, Brussels,
1992) ,}
_{calculated
from the figures on pages 55, 61, 97, 110, 205 and 212.}
_{* For
the other West European countries the statistical data is insufficient
to make these calculations.}

Consequences of this development

It may be clear that this development considerably changed the situation of film exhibition in Europe: besides the success of domestic films, the trading results of the exhibitors were and still are mainly dependent on the success of US films, which also changed their market position vice versa the distributors of the US majors.

Support of European films

The weak position of European film production caused numerous measures of support for especially national production in many European countries, and from the end of the eighties on, also by the European Union. The latter support, concerning an amount of money being about 10% of the total support in Member States, nevertheless comes down to a considerable sum. However, this support is not for production itself, but increasingly for the distribution of non domestic European films.

During the Festival of Cannes in May 1999 the head of the MEDIA Programme of the European Union observed that, regrettably, market shares of non domestic European films had decreased generally from 1997 to 1998. This is shown in Table 2.

At the same time it was announced that in MEDIA III still more European money will be used in support of the distribution of non domestic European films.

Table 2 Market shares (based on admissions) of non domestic European films (%)

	1997	1998
B	13.4	22.1
CH^*	21.0	21.7
D	11.5	5.7
DK	13.1	9.1
E	17.6	8.4
F	10.0	7.2
I	15.9	10.8
NL	10.5	4.1
S	14.9	8.8
Total	13.4	8.7

_{Source: European Cinema
Yearbook (Media Salles,1998) and European Cinema Journal (Media Salles,
no.1-April 1999)}
_{* Not participating
in the MEDIA Programme.}

The development of admissions to non domestic European films and their resp. market shares are shown in Table 3.

Table 3 Indices of market shares, resp. of admissions to non domestic European films (1992 = 100)

		1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998
B	market share admissions	100 100	85 99	84 108	108 125	56 72	69 93	115 173
CH	market share admissions	100 100	77 89	56 66	83 89	84 92	73 82	75 86
D	market share admissions	100 100	55 68	105 132	82 97	144 180	185 251	92 129
DK	market share admissions	100 100	153 181	203 242	218 222	450 515	385 483	268 341
E	market share admissions	100 100	77 81	128 139	109 121	89 112	133 170	64 83
F	market share admissions	100 100	94 107	185 199	179 201	132 156	213 273	153 225
I	market share admissions	100 100	87 97	77 91	82 89	88 101	112 131	76 113
NL	market share admissions	100 100	163 190	237 277	250 300	120 147	350 485	137 201
S	market share admissions	100 100	. .	249 252	215 204	225 221	281 273	166 168

_{* Source: same as for Table 2}

What becomes clear in Table 3, is that the development of admissions to (non domestic) European films is less unfavourable than the development of the corresponding market shares. This means that box office from non domestic European films is more stable – be it on a level that is judged as being too low – than the corresponding market shares. This is, of course, caused by the fact that these market shares to a high degree are dependent of the success of US films.

This is still more clearly demonstrated in Table 4: from 1992 to 1998 admissions to non domestic European films increased by 27%, whilst market shares even decreased (by 10%). Understandably however, it are just the market shares that get attention and matter politically.

Table 4 Indices of admissions to all films, resp. to non domestic European films and their market shares (adm.); 1992 = 100, resp. 1989 = 100 (without Sweden)

	1989	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998
all films	102 100	100 98	114 112	115 113	113 110	121 118	127 125	141 138
non domestic European films	150 100	100 67	90 60	125 84	119 79	124 83	176 118	127 85
market shares	142 100	100 69	78 54	108 74	103 71	102 70	137 94	90 62

A last remark concerns the comparison with 1989, when the MEDIA Programme began. From 1989 to 1998 admissions to non domestic European films decreased by 15%, whilst their market shares even with 38%!