At the traditional FFA presentation "Figures - Data - Facts" on developments in the arthouse cinema market, FFA Deputy Director Martin Michaelis and Norina Lin-Hi, Head of the FFA's Market Research and Statistics Department, were able to announce some good news.
According to Press Release In terms of ticket sales, arthouse cinemas will grow by 35% in 2023 compared to 2022, while cinemas as a whole sold 23% more tickets last year than in the previous year. Compared to 2019, arthouse cinemas are therefore only 17% behind, while cinemas as a whole are still 19% behind compared to 2019.
The development of reach - i.e. the proportion of the population that has been to the cinema at least once - is also very pleasing with regard to arthouse-only cinemas: while the gap for cinemas as a whole was 18% in 2023 compared to 2019, it was only 14% for arthouse-only cinemas and was therefore lower.
In addition, "Sun and Concrete" and the crossover films "Barbie" and "Oppenheimer", among others, significantly rejuvenated the audience for arthouse films. The average age fell from 51.8 years in 2022 to 45.2 years.
The FFA is forecasting 89.5 million tickets for 2024 and hopes that this figure can be exceeded in view of the film releases announced for the year. These include the FFA-funded "The School of Magical Beasts 3", for the second part of which 2.9 million tickets were sold.
