According to the cinema association Film & Kino, total admissions reached 11.29 million in 2019, worth NOK1.3 billion in box office revenue. Although this represents 6.8% drop in admissions from 2018, the level is still “almost on par the yearly average of the years 2000,” noted the cinema association’s managing director Guttorm Petterson.

Hollywood films such as The Lion King, Avengers: Endgame and Joker were major audience-pullers and contributed to US film’s 65.3% market share.

Norwegian films however saw their slice of the market drop significantly, from 25.1% in 2018 to 18.4%, and admissions were 32% below the 3,048,463 registered in 2018, with 2,077,459 total count.

Revenue-wise, local films posted NOK 210.4 million, down 35.6% from 2018.

Also, two years ago, five local films were in the top 10, including three that sold more than 400,000 admissions (The Quake, The 12th Man, Louis & Luca-Mission to the Moon), in 2019 four titles find a spot in the top 10 but only one sold north of 400,000: the family film Forgotten Christmas (Snekker Andersen og Julenissen: den vesle bygda som glømte at det var jul).

The three other best-selling Norwegian films that each attracted more than 200,000 filmgoers were The Ash Lad: In Search of the Golden Castle, Captain Sabertooth and the Magic Diamond – two family films based on celebrated characters – and the survival biopic Amundsen.

Stine Helgeland, Head of Department Communications, Strategic Insight and International Relations at the Norwegian Film Institute stressed that 2019 was a ‘middle-year’ for Norwegian films compared to the all time record of 2018. She also noted the great fluctuation of their market share over the last decade, from 17,9% in 2012 to 25,1% in 2018. “Therefore I am not worried by a single year,” she said, mentioning as well the strong performance abroad of Norwegian films such as Out Stealing Horses in Competition in Berlin, Beware of Children at Venice Days, Toronto, Thessaloniki and Busan, Maria Sødahls Hope in Toronto, going on to Palm Springs and Panorama in Berlin in 2020, among others.”  

Looking ahead, Helgeland said she has “high expectations for 2020, with more than 30 films lined-up and some really strong films - both artistically and box office wise – among them Børning 3, Tonje Hessen Schei’s documentary IHuman, Eskil Vogt’s The Innocent, Bent Hamer’s The Middle Man, Thomas Robsahm’s documentary A-ha – The Movie, Erik Skjoldbjærg’s big WW2 epic Narvik among others.”

To see Norway's 2019 - January to December Admissions Charts: CLICK HERE.