French films will lose 11% of their spectators abroad in 2024

French films made slightly less revenue abroad in 2024, attracting 38.1 million spectators to theaters, in a difficult context for world cinema, according to figures published by Unifrance on Monday. The export performance of French cinema, which has been on the decline every year since Covid, is this time down 11% year-on-year. French films brought in 250 million euros in revenue.

These figures « mark a return to normality »explained to AFP Gilles Pélisson, the president of Unifrance (organization responsible for promoting French cinema and audiovisual internationally), in a difficult context for cinemas in most countries of the world. He also notes « belles progressions » on the platforms, where new French releases rank, for example, far behind American or British productions but clearly ahead of South Korean works.

Waiting Emilia Perez

In 2025, French films could be driven by the awards season in the United States, where Emilia Perez by Jacques Audiard has just won four Golden Globes, underlines Gilles Pélisson. As for A little something extrahit of the year in France, « it is sold and marketed in many countries even if the entries are not there yet ». In theaters last year, Germany was the country most fond of French productions, with 4.1 million admissions, ahead of Russia (3.7 million admissions), an important outlet for French cinema. , where American films are no longer officially broadcast since the invasion of Ukraine. Mexico occupies third place on the podium (2.6 million entries).

On the film side, the new adaptation of Comte de Monte Cristowith Pierre Niney, success in France, had a good career abroad. It is the most seen film of the year outside the borders (3.3 million admissions, 20.7 million euros in revenue in 54 countries), notably in Belgium and Luxembourg but also in Bulgaria or in Ukraine. Anatomy of a fallPalme d’Or in 2023, has continued to attract moviegoers around the world, with 4.9 million admissions since its release, including 3.2 million last year. On the third step of the podium, The Last Jaguara family adventure film which only had one million admissions in France, attracted 2.4 million spectators in the rest of the world.