France was one of the few markets to see admissions increase year-on-year in 2024, driven by a powerhouse top 10, three of which were local blockbusters.
Admissions reached 181.3 million admissions, up a slight 0.5% on 2023, according to figures from Comscore and the CNC. Total box office for the year was an estimated €1.3 billion ($1.35bn) based on an average ticket price of €7.20, driven largely by French films that took a 44.4% market share, the highest since 2008.
However this was still 12.8% down from the pre-pandemic yearly average of the 2017-2019 period.
Scroll down for full top 30 chart
An uneven 2024 started off slowly with just 55.9 million ticket sales between January and April, the lowest level since 1999 (excluding the 2020-2022 pandemic period). From May onwards, propelled by the May 1 release of A Little Something Extra (Pan Distribution) then followed by a succession of Hollywood franchises and local successes, ticket sales skyrocketed for a return to near pre-pandemic levels with 125.4 admissions for the eight-month period since, down just 2.7% on the 2017-2019 average.
A Little Something Extra, directed by and starring Artus alongside a cast of mostly non-professional actors with disabilities, took the top spot with 10.8 million admissions. It sold the most tickets for a French film since local comedy Serial (Bad) Weddings in 2014 and was the best debut feature for a French filmmaker since Just Jaeckin’s 1974 erotic drama Emmanuelle. Pathé’s epic literary adaptation The Count Of Monte Cristo took the second spot with 9.3 million admissions.
Gilles Lellouche’s romantic musical Beating Hearts (Studiocanal) edged into the fifth spot with 4.8 million admissions, already Studiocanal’s highest grossing film in France to date. Those three French films in the top five racked up some 25 million admissions among them, the first time a trio of local language titles have done so since 2011 according to the CNC.
The top 10 films of the year accounted for 32% of total ticket sales (57.9 million tickets ) the most in some 20 years.
“Today, French cinema knows how to do it all: all genres and all stories, for all audiences,” suggested Olivier Henrard, acting president of the CNC. “It is the diversity and uniqueness of our works - historical drama, generational stories, musicals, social comedies, documentaries, animated films - that explain the rebound in overall attendance and the unrivalled market share of our national films worldwide.”
Other French titles bolstering the local box office included Pathe’s Charles Aznavour biopic Monsieur Aznavour, local comedies Oh La La (SND), Oldies but Goodies (Apollo Films), Cat & Dog (Gaumont), and Open Season (UGC), all in the top 20 titles of the year.
Arthouse films held hold their own led by France’s international Oscar entry Emilia Perez (Le Pacte) and a slew of Pyramide titles including The Seed Of The Scared Fig, Souleymane’s Story and Holy Cow. All premiered at the Cannes film festival in May.
The highest-grossing non-French and non-US studio film was UK independent title One Life, directed by James Hawes and starring Anthony Hopkins as Nicholas Winton, the British stockbroker who saved the lives of 669 children from the Nazis in the 1930s. It was developed and produced by See-Saw Films with BBC Film. SND released in France.
The year ended as the monthly box office for December rose 18% year on year to reach 20.46 million admissions (€147.3m), powered by Disney family films Moana 2 and Mufasa: The Lion King and French feel-good drama The Marching Band (Diaphana) that has stomped its way to 1.6 million admissions since its November . 27 release.
Looking ahead, according to Marc-Olivier Sebbag, executive director of France’s National Cinema Federation (FNCF), “2025 should be an even more favorable year, thanks to a denser selection of films and box-office levels that will enable us to maintain this excellent momentum.”
France Top 30, 2024
| Title (origin) | Distributor | Release date | Admissions | Gross (€)* | Gross ($)* | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A Little Something Extra (Fr) |
Pan Distribution | 1/5/24 | 10,807,896 | 77.8m | 80.4m |
| 2 | The Count Of Monte-Cristo (Bel-Fr) | Pathé Distribution | 28/6/24 | 9,345,566 | 67.3m | 69.5m |
| 3 | Inside Out 2 (US) | Disney | 19/6/24 | 8,415,274 | 60.6m | 62.6m |
| 4 | Moana 2 (US) | Disney | 27/11/24 | 6,698,829 | 48.2m | 49.8m |
| 5 | Beating Hearts (Bel-Fr) | Studiocanal | 16/10/24 | 4,810,612 | 34.6m | 35.8m |
| 6 | Despicable Me 4 (US) | Universal | 10/7/24 | 4,472,127 | 32.2m | 33.3m |
| 7 | Dune: Part Two (US) | Warner Bros | 28/2/24 | 4,202,653 | 30.3m | 31.3m |
| 8 | Deadpool & Wolverine (US) | Disney | 24/7/24 | 3,716,208 | 26.8m | 27.6m |
| 9 | Gladiator II (US) | Paramount | 13/11/24 | 2,915,456 | 21m | 21.7m |
| 10 | Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes (US) | Disney | 8/5/24 | 2,530,409 | 18.2m | 18.8m |
| 11 | Kung Fu Panda 4 (US) | Universal | 27/3/24 | 2,395,576 | 17.2m | 17.8m |
| 12 | Mufasa: The Lion King (US) | Disney | 18/12/24 | 2,243,065 | 16.2m | 16.7m |
| 13 | Monsieur Aznavour (Fr) | Pathé Distribution | 23/10/24 | 2,033,145 | 14.6m | 15.1m |
| 14 | Bob Marley: One Love (US) | Paramount | 14/2/24 | 2,003,597 | 14.4m | 14.9m |
| 15 | Cocorico (Fr) | SND | 7/2/24 | 1,981,739 | 14.3m | 14.7m |
| 16 | The Wild Robot (US) | Universal | 9/10/24 | 1,801,499 | 13m | 13.4m |
| 17 | Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (US) | Warner Bros | 11/9/24 | 1,713,436 | 12.3m | 12.7m |
| 18 | One Life (UK-US) | SND | 21/2/24 | 1,610,042 | 11.6m | 12m |
| 19 | Juror #2 (US) | Warner Bros | 30/10/24 | 1,594,326 | 11.5m | 11.9m |
| 20 | Maison De Retraite 2 (Fr) | Apollo Films | 14/2/24 | 1,562,233 | 11.2m | 11.6m |
| 21 | Wonka (UK-US) | Warner Bros | 13/12/23 | 1,526,855 | 11m | 11.4m |
| 22 | The Marching Band (Fr) | Diaphana | 27/11/24 | 1,519,880 | 10.9m | 11.3m |
| 23 | Venom: The Last Dance (US) | Sony | 30/10/24 | 1,472,053 | 10.6m | 11m |
| 24 | Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (US) | Warner Bros | 3/4/24 | 1,310,245 | 9.4m | 9.7m |
| 25 | It Ends With Us (US) | Sony | 11/8/24 | 1,309,529 | 9.4m | 9.7m |
| 26 | Bad Boys: Ride Or Die (US) | Sony | 5/6/24 | 1,242,908 | 8.9m | 9.2m |
| 27 | IF (US) |
Paramount | 8/5/24 | 1,194,076 | 8.6m | 8.9m |
| 28 | Cat And Dog (Fr) | Gaumont | 14/2/24 | 1,141,423 | 8.2m | 8.5m |
| 29 | Alien: Romulus (US) | Disney | 14/8/24 | 1,135,059 | 8.2m | 8.4m |
| 30 | Open Season (Fr) | UGC | 20/12/23 | 1,117,765 | 8m | 8.3m |
Figures courtesy of Comscore/CNC
* Estimated based on an average ticket price of €7.20
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