Cinema sales go up despite recession

Despite talk of people sitting out the recession at home and watching more TV, European cinema ticket sales continue to be robust.

According to the latest survey by the European Audiovisual Observatory, total cinema admissions across Europe in 2009 totaled about 985 million tickets sold.

Amongst EU states for which data was available, Germany achieved the most significant growth (up 13.1% or 16.9 million) followed by France (up 5.7% or 10.9 million), the UK (up 5.6% or 5.4 million) and Poland (up 16.1% or 5.4 million). Spanish admissions increased by 2.8%, while those in Italy fell marginally by 0.4%. Outside the EU, cinema admissions in Russia grew by 11.8% during the year to reach 138.5 million).

Increases were mostly driven by US movies including the 3D versions of Ice Age 3, Avatar and Up. Local films captured a 32.7% share in Sweden, 27.4% in Germany and 15.4% in Spain. Only in Turkey did local product take a majority of share, with 51%.