06-02-2011

Mission London Tops Bulgarian 2010 Admissions

By Pavlina Jeleva

    With 376,843 admissions Dimitar Mitovski's Mission London (www.mission-london.com) outperformed James Cameron's Avatar which ended the year with 300,205 admissions. However, Avatar earned €1,743,807 in box office, putting it in first place, followed by Mission London with €1,344,855 .

    Data for the Top Ten box office was provided the National Film Center (www.nfc.bg) provisional data.

    The films were distributed by Alexandra (leading distributor of U.S. majors) and Bulgarian firm A+ Films (www.facebook.com/aplusfilms). The two companies took in nearly 60% of the market share.

    Distributed by Sunny Films (www.sunnyfilms.com) Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time took the third position with €661,439 and 167,180 admissions. With €644.186 and 112,377 admissions Alexandra's Clash of the Titans ranked fourth. Shrek Forever After, distributed by Forum Films (www.forumfilm.bg) was in fifth place with €561,327 and 98,749 admissions.

    The remainder of the Top Ten were Tangled, distributed by Forum Films (€438 290); Sherlock Holmes €434;077, Inception (€432,098) and Sex and the City 2 (€417,373), all distributed by Alexandra; and The Expendables (€362,166), the only Top Ten film distributed by Tandem.

    Total admissions for 2010 was 3,927,390 and box office was €16,466,653. Admissions were considerably down from the prediction of 5 million; however the success of Mission London lifted the Bulgarian films market share from its usual 3% to 7,28%. European films reached a market share of 18,93%.

    With €54,052 and 16,732 admissions Zvetodar Markov's HDSM (http://hdsp.bg/) became the second ranked Bulgarian title. Reaching 6,384 admissions and €12,287 The Golden River was in third place. Most Bulgarian titles remained far behind: Crayfish had 2,173 admissions and €2 423, and The Ravishment had only 205 and €596.

    The low number of theatres and screens is still considered the major problem for art house distributors. With only 35 theatres and 141 screens in the country and 10 theatres and 64 screens in Sofia their number has been constantly decreasing.

    Including the first and second showings 206 titles were distributed, including 39 European films and 15 Bulgarian films.