Estonian cinema audience prefers more and more domestic films

When in 2007 the rate of foreign film attendance decreased by about 3% in Estonia, the attendance of domestic films increased by about two thirds compared to 2006 and its number amounted to nearly 210,000. The total cinema attendance in 2007 was over 1.6 million, which is a record after the restoration of independence in Estonia.

The most popular Estonian films were “Jan Uuspõld Goes to Tartu” with 73,000 attendees, “Georg” with 49,000 attendees and “Autumn Ball” with 38,000 attendees. According to the data of Estonian Film Foundation, all these are also in top 10 of Estonian most popular films in 2007.

The average proportion of domestic films in cinema has been 1.5% after the restoration of independence in Estonia. It has made a jump during the last few years amounting to 18% in 2007. In total 155 different films were shown in Estonian cinemas, of which 28 were made in Estonia. More than half of them were in the repertoire of “Kinobuss” (Cinema Bus), which is a well known project in Estonia.

Since 2000, the number of full length feature films made in Estonia has increased and there were eight of these in 2006. Seven full length feature films were released in 2007. In addition 23 other full length films were made, of which 15 were documentaries. The number of short films (less than 52 minutes) was 149. Five of them were animations and 47 documentaries. In total 179 films were made in Estonia in 2007.

The average ticket price that in 2007 was 68 kroons has been quite stable during the last years, although showing a small growing trend in larger scale. In Latvia and Lithuania the ticket price is by about a quarter cheaper but it is almost twice as expensive in Finland. In 2006 the average ticket price in Finland was 118 kroons, in Latvia 55 kroons and in Lithuania 45 kroons. The average cinema ticket price in the European Union was 93 kroons.^a

Cinema attendance, 2003–2007

^a European Audiovisual Observatory.