The Pepe Willberg documentary has only received 9,000 viewers – “These kinds of viewership numbers kill the road in theaters”

Finns movies have done very well this year. Domestic films will soon exceed the two million audience mark, says Filmikamar’s CEO Tero Koistinen.

That hasn’t happened in six years.

Brightest in the lead is porcupines this year Myrskyluoto Maija (468,736 viewers). So far, the second largest number of viewers for domestic films has been collected this year Creditor movie: All In (324 485).

But what about domestic documents?

When looking at the list, attention is drawn to their low viewership numbers. Three documentaries about well-known people in the music and entertainment industry have been published in Finland this year: pop singer Almastashooting star About Pepe and a stand-up comedian Ismo from Leikola. All three documentaries have gathered several thousand viewers. So they have no business being at the top of the list of the most watched films of the year.

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If the image is that you will see the documentary soon on TV, many may skip going to the cinema.

In March published Alma – Life Must Be Beautiful (ranked 130 on the list of the most watched films of the year at the time of the article’s publication) received a little less than four thousand viewers in cinemas.

Came to cinemas a month ago Pepe (ranked 91) has attracted more than 9,300 viewers so far. Ismo – the funniest outsider in the world (ranked 119) premiered last Friday. So far, the documentary is off to a good start. It has gathered more than 5,000 viewers.

“It seems to be the case that Documentary films in general get quite a few viewers. One reason could be that some people might think of a documentary as a television genre,” says Koistinen.

“The fact is that, as a rule, domestic documentaries are 100% bought by Yleisradio, which means they come out on television quite quickly.”

That’s about it is about mental images. According to Koistinen, if the image is that they will see the documentary soon on TV, many people might not go to the cinema because of that.

Pepen supervisor Severi Koivusalo also believes that many people easily confuse documentary film narration with TV narration.

“I think people perceive documentaries as such content that they don’t go to see them in cinemas. We go there to see something that offers the promise of a movie theater like big Hollywood stuff. The documents will be lost there.”

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“It does not diminish the importance of the documents.”

Koistinen reminds us that documentary films are often not marketed very spectacularly either.

“But that doesn’t diminish the beauty and importance of the documentaries. Many great docs have remained in the small numbers.”

Koistenen by Pepen and the audience figures for the other mentioned works are “fairly typical figures for documentaries”.

Koivusalo says Pepen has been a big success, judging by feedback and viewership metrics.

“Who wouldn’t want more viewers, but that’s a good number,” he says.

Koivusalo resents the short arcs of documentaries in cinemas. He believes that the target group of his film may wake up a little slower, but may still watch the documentary over a longer period of time.

“Such viewership figures kill [elokuvien] road theaters. All the basis for the first weekend. If it gets bad viewership on the first weekend, there are no theaters on the second weekend or it is shown at bad times. Even if the film is megalomaniacally good,” says Koivusalo.

“It is also forgotten by yourself as a consumer.”

If a documentary really interests you, you should watch it right away.

Finland The most watched documentaries in cinemas of all time are The story of the lake (187 547), Sel8ne (130,530) and The story of the forest (91,331), all very impressive documents. Especially The lake and Stories of the forest need a screen, according to Koistinen.

Ice hockey player Teemu from Selänte According to Koistinen, the success of the narrative documentary is also explained by Selänte’s high star status.

“After all, we have very internationally successful documentary filmmakers, such as, for example Virpi Shoemaker and Pirjo Honkasalo. They make great and big-screen documentaries.”