Over at Cineuropa.org, Harald Olkus reports box office data for Austria in 2008. Admissions totalled around 15.7 million, much the same as in 2007, but the market share of local films rose from 1.9% to over 6%. Successful local fare included Echte Wiener – Die Sackbauer Saga, Oscar-winning The Counterfeiters, and Falco - Verdammt, wir leben noch!.
A more timely update has been provided for France by the Centre national de la cinématographie, with the release of admissions figures for the first three months of the year.
Cinema ticket sales fell by an eye-watering 15.2% over this period, totalling around 52 million compared with 61 million in 2008:
Source: CNC
But as John Hopewell, writing in Variety, notes, this is not a result of the recession dragging down the market. The annual decline in admissions has come about because the first quarter of 2008 saw exceptional business on the back of the runaway success of Dany Boon's Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis (Welcome to the Sticks), which opened at the end of February. The film sold most tickets in March 2008 and went on to become the top performing French film of all time.
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