Record in Polish cinemas: the most popular movies of 2016.

Polish cinemas sold almost 52 million tickets last year, a record for the decade! Polish productions were chosen by 13 million people, and the most watched film was Pitbull. Dangerous Women (Pitbull. Niebezpieczne kobiety) And since the film industry is especially close to us, we will take a look at the last year’s  “box office,”  the number of tickets sold and revenue.

For clarity, it is worth to point out that the data from the box office statistics are not the net income of producers and co-producers, since they represent the gross revenue of cinema  ticket sales. So before they reach the producer, first a part of the money stay in the cinema, then the distributors’ commission is deducted, as well as P & A expenses (i.e. simply the costs of promotion and advertising), followed by the return of the so-called MG (minimum guaranteed – a form of non-refundable advance payment of profits from the film), of course if it was provided for in the agreement with the distributor and it was paid to the producer during the production of the film. The remainder then goes only to the producer. What is important, the box office does not include any other income from the exploitation of films – such as DVDs, inserts, VODs, free and paid TV, merchandising, etc. Although, the box office does not give the full picture of the economic situation of the film industry, it sheds a light on film attendance, trends and tastes of film audiences and the condition of the industry.

In Poland, the industry broke a record this year – with a total of 51,583,568 tickets sold, and Polish productions attracted as many as 13 million viewers for the first time! The cinemas earned a total of PLN 960 million with a relatively slight increase in average ticket prices (an average of PLN 18.4 per ticket in 2015, and PLN 18.6 in 2016).Polish box office returns  during 2005-2016 looks interesting and promising:

An IP BLOG study based on data from the National Film Institute (https://www.pisf.pl/rynek-filmowy/rynek-filmowy/widzowie)
2016 was a record year – both in terms of the total number of tickets sold, and in terms of the number of tickets sold for Polish films (only 2011 was comparable – 11.8 million tickets sold). Furthermore, it should be noted that in principle the number of viewers in Polish cinemas grows every year. Referring to Polish films, we can draw a conclusion similar toother productions, but there are minor anomalies (with an upward trend).
Another nice surprise is the viewing ranking of individual films in Polish cinemas. First place went to Pitbull. Dangerous Women (Pitbull. Niebezpieczne kobiety). Second place went to the home production The Planet of Singles (Planeta Singli), ahead of such global hits as the next editions of Ice Age, Bridget Jones and Star Wars.

Box office for Polish cinemas divided into movies (IP BLOG study based on the data from the Association of Polish Filmmakers – https://www.sfp.org.pl/wydarzenia,5,24354,1,1,Podsumowanie-polskiego-Box- Office-2016.html; up to 10 items)

It should be noted that five Polish productions exceeded the magic threshold of 1 million viewers. Such films as My Daughters Cows (735 thousand viewers) and the Last Family (504 thousand viewers) look quite well in the overall summary.

What moviegoers around the world are watching?

The list of the most successful films in terms of overall world market (data for 2016) looks also interesting:

(IP BLOG study based on the data from Filmweb: http://www.filmweb.pl/boxOffice/ranking?countryId=&genreId=&year=2016; 10 items)

It is worth noting that on the world market, in contrast to the summary for the Polish cinema, there are no surprises. The most popular are animated films, Marvel films, the prequel to Harry Potter and the continuation of Star Wars – i.e. the big commercial productions. Based on these data we can make one more conclusion – Disney fit the best the tastes of audiences in 2016 (USD 7.6 billion of income from ticket sales [1]).

Renaissance of the Polish cinema?

Each and every year the number of viewers in Polish cinemas grows, and the last year was undoubtedly a record year. We are glad also that audiences tend to want to go to see Polish productions, including those which are not easy to digest, for example Wojtek Smarzowski’s Hatred (Wołyń) – almost 1.5 million viewers!. The world summary is governed by some other laws – overall, big film productions win. We are also proud that among the best (including both art and commercial films) productions there are ones that we support from the legal perspective (we worked for the most popular series – the Pitbull, among others). What will the box office look like next year? We will see. But from the perspective of phenomenal film projects in which we are currently involved, it looks like it will be a very interesting and exciting year in Polish cinemas. Enjoy watching!

[1] http://www.thewrap.com/disney-becomes-first-studio-top-3-billion-domestic-box-office/