The NFVF release January - December 04 Box Office Report

The NFVF release January December 2014 Box Office Report

The National Film and Video Foundation, (NFVF) an agency of the Department of Arts and Culture continually conducts research into varying aspects of the film industry. The researches are conducted in order to develop a better understanding of the industry. The foundation has therefore released the Box Office report for the January December 2014 period.

Year 2014 marked a period where South African's experienced challenges with electricity supply constraints, repeated strikes and a weak recovery of the rand. Most recently economic indicators suggested a passive economic environment which contributed relatively to a slow growth.

Due to other challenges including the ones listed about, the film industry, like any other industries was affected. The industry experienced a slow recovery in terms of growth in Box Office revenues generated. A total of 228 films were released at box office during the period under review, 23 of those being SA films. The report indicates that South Africans continue to show keen interest for the imported titles, with local films only claiming 6% market share at box office. Theatrical revenues for all films released in South Africa totaled to R 880.3 million in 2014, an increase of 0.13% compared to 2013. Foreign films experienced growth by 6%, while South African films declined by 44% in 2014.

Commenting on the Box Office decline, which has also has impact on audience development Ms. Zama Mkosi, NFVF CEO indicated that the foundation is working on strategies to ensure that South Africans appreciate local films. Ms. Mkosi mentions that the NFVF conducted an Audience Research earlier in the year, which its preliminary report indicated that amongst others; access to cinemas, cinema experience and the content we provide to consumers play a key role in cinema attendance. To remedy this we will be developing an Audience Development strategy to ensure South Africa's appreciation of local films.

The most popular films with the highest gross in 2014 were Transformers: Age of Extinction, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, and How to Train your Dragon 2. The highest performing local film was Pad na Jou Hart which earned R11.6 million, the second highest grossing film was Leading Lady taking only R7.6 million while Faan se Trein earned R7.2 million at third place. It was noted with interest that 6 of the films in the top 10 of local films were Afrikaans language films which is an indication of the growing audience for Afrikaans movies.

All is not lost for Black films' great performance as the NFVF has designed projects that would ensure that the local audiences support their films. We have launched Youth Filmmaker and Women Projects to ensure that emerging filmmakers' skills are honed, says Ms. Mkosi. Together with Industrial Development Corporation and the Department of Trade and Industry, the NFVF now offers black emerging filmmakers an opportunity to access funds from the Emerging Black Filmmakers Transformation Fund launched in July 2014. The fund was designed to address the scarcity of the release of films produced by black filmmaker.

Once again Animation was the highest grossing genre, some of the biggest films of the year coming on top: How to Train Your Dragon 2 and Rio 2. A combined gross for animation summed to R140.2 million. Action/Adventure was the second highest earning genre of the year with a combined gross of R139.9 million. Drama was the third with combined gross of R120.2 million.

In terms of distribution the biggest portion of market share was generated by Times Media Distribution (TM) claiming 49% of the total box office gross, a huge improvement from 36% claimed in 2013. Ster Kinekor (SK) was the second highest distributor claiming 31% market share, a decrease from 39% in 2013. The third biggest share was taken by United International Pictures (UIP) claiming 14% of the total gross, a drop from 22% claimed in 2013.

Regardless of the report, local films continue to be appreciated internationally. Local films comprising current releases; Four Corners, Hear me Move, Hard to Get and Cold Harbour continue to raise the South African flag. At the recently held 2015 Pan African Film Festival, Four Corners was nominated for Best Narrative Feature while Cold Harbour was selected for Best First Feature Narrative. Another local film that screened at the festival, Thina so Babili won an Audience Award. These achievements, together with others the country continues to receive are testament that our industry has Come of Age, and that our stories are appreciated by the rest of the world. It is now up to us South Africans to support the local releases, to further ensure that our films continue to contribute to the national economy as indicated in the 2012 Economic Baseline Study Report, states Ms. Mkosi.

From the report, it is evident that efforts to develop a strong cinema-going culture and to get more audiences to choose South African films at the cinema needs to be further exploited.

The NFVF looks forward to interesting titles already being released including Mooirivier an Afrikaans language romantic comedy, and South Africa's first dance film Hear me Move.

A detailed report may be downloaded from the NFVF website on this link:

Box Office Report January-December 2014

LINK:	http://nfvf.co.za/home/index.php?ipkMenuID=&ipkArticleID=219...
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