The Real Best of 2006
Mark Nornes
amnornes at umich.edu
Thu Jan 18 09:44:59 EST 2007
Since people are posting their best/worth lists of 2006, I thought
I'd add some more data to the mix. As Aaron always points out, these
lists are mostly interesting as representations of a given
publication's collective take on the state of Japanese cinema (or an
individual's, should you wade into the numbers). But a more crucial
data set comes out of the industry, and 2006 proved to be a
significant year—statistically speaking.
In the Dec. 28 Variety, Mark reported that the market share for
domestic films was expected to hit the 50% mark for the first time
since 1985, and production may have exceeded 400 titles for the first
time since 1973. He adds,
> Although no Japanese film has crossed the Y10 billion ($88.6
> million) line this year, the number of titles grossing Y5 billion
> ($26 million) or more -- the local measure of a blockbuster -- has
> hit six, an all-time high.
>
> As a result, total B.O. for the year is expected to surpass last
> year's $1.71 billion.
To give you a sense for how significant these numbers are in the
global scheme of things, German B.O. for last year was a bit over
$706 milliion; that is for a year of double digit growth, thanks to
some domestic hits.
By way of contrast, Japan doesn't look as impressive next to South
Korea. After a decade of growth, South Korea has cracked the $1
billion mark in total B.O., and domestic films pulled in 61% of the
grosses (in comparison to 34% for U.S. films).
The numbers, at least, bode well for the 2007 film season.
Markus
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/kinejapan/attachments/20070118/08c2ebaa/attachment.html
More information about the KineJapan
mailing list