Denmark infuses hope for cinema re-openings across the Nordics

Nordicfilmandtvnews.com has taken a snapshot of the theatrical landscape in the Nordics.

After Icelandic cinemas that reopened April 15, Denmark followed suit May 6. Restrictions in place before cinema closures in December were reinstated, such as maximum 500 people screen capacity, and 1 metre safety distance between cohorts. But the big novelty was the introduction of the ‘corona pass’, confirming that cinemagoers were tested negative in the past 72 hours, vaccinated or had recently recovered from Covid-19.

Quizzed about the possible impact of the corona pass on cinema-going on the eve of cinemas’ return to business, Danish professionals voiced their optimism. “This new measure may sound like a challenge, but at the moment, Denmark is testing over 500,000 a day, which is about 10% of the population, so I actually do not think it will be a problem,” told Claus Ladegaard, CEO at the Danish Film Institute to nordicfilmandtvnews.com.

Lars Werge, Head of the cinema association Dansk Biografer expected the corona pass “to be obstructive to some of the cinema guests” and was somewhat nervous about the loss of spontaneous ticket buys from the younger generation in particular.

Scanbox Entertainment’s Head of Theatrical Merete Christensen was hoping that the wide use of the corona pass for various entertainment and consumption activities, would eventually turn it into a routine check, even for youngsters, making cinema-going still a spontaneous favourite outing.

Ladegaard was also highly confident about local films’ ability to drive audiences back into cinemas: “I'm pretty sure people long to experience films together again. We're all sick and tired of sitting at home and watching Netflix and old movies on our flat screens. And there are plenty of titles to choose from,” he noted.

Last weekend’s strong opening figures for Danish films seemed to prove him right.

Three Danish films under the Nordisk Film banner, whose ticket sales had been halted in December, were back in the top 5 according to figures from the Association of Film Distributors FAFID.

• Anders Thomas Jensen’s Riders of Justice stormed to the top of the charts and sold an extra 28,153 tickets from 113 screens, pushing total admissions to 510,172.
• Søren-Kragh Jacobsen’s The Butterfly Swings ranked third and added 17,028 tickets for a total sale of 77,723.
  
• Thomas Vinterberg’s Oscar winning Another Round took the 5^th place with 10,697 tickets sold, despite four-months spent on domestic home entertainment. Tickets sales for the film have now reached a record 817,291.
  

Meanwhile the new Nordisk Film release -the US actioner Chaos Walking came in at number 4, making it the third film starring Mads Mikkelsen in the Top 5 with Riders of Justice and Another Round.

A total of 10 new titles entered the top 15, including UIP’s Promising Young Woman, Arctic Justice, the Oscar winners Minari, (Scanbox) Sound of Metal (Camera Film), SF Studios’ Godzilla vs Kong, Another World Entertainment’s Swedish thriller The Other Side, Italian drama The Best Years, and Øst for Paradis’ music documentary Once Were Brothers.

Commenting on the fresh admission figures, Nordisk Film’s Head of Distribution in Denmark Frederik Honoré said “the results have exceeded all expectations”. “It looks extremely promising for both Danish films and Danish cinemas in the near future,” he said.

Finland, Norway, Sweden on the starting blocks
Meanwhile in Sweden, around 200 out of 800 screens are open of which 150 from Svenska Bio, owned by the influential head of the Swedish Exhibitors’Association Peter Fornstam.

The latter said that the Swedish government has announced plans to ease restrictions May 17, when the punitive 8 people per screen limit since November 24, might be raised to 50.
The biggest cinema chain -AMC-controlled Filmstaden and its 38 cinema venues, has been closed since November and might start operating again in June, depending on the screen limits, said Fornstam. The seasoned exhibitor was grateful for the various government support packages that have helped cinemas hold on during the pandemic. “The Cultural Department has understood our problems and forwarded liquidity to the industry at a speed where we so far, have been able to stay afloat,” he said.

In Finland and Norway, a complete reopening of venues is not expected before next month. The biggest hindrance to the full film roll-out is the closure of cinemas in the Oslo and Helsinki areas. “The capital area is crucial,” said Tero Koistinen, Head of Filmikamari, the Finnish Chamber of Films. “The market share of the Helsinki area is around 35%, so if it stays closed, it limits the premieres of new titles,” he noted. So far, admission per screen capacity in Finnish cinemas ranges from 6, 10, 20 to 50. On Wednesday, the Finnish Chamber of Films condemned regional government agencies’ attempt to block the central government’s exit plan, and putting further pressure on the overall industry.

The Finnish Chamber of Films estimates that the current loss of cinema turnover due to Covid-19 nears €110 million. Koistinen also condemned the lack of government support to the sector. “Compared to our friends and colleagues in all other Nordic countries, we have had peanuts!” said Koistinen, although he was grateful for the recent €8 million package available to small to mid-sized cinemas, administered by the Finnish Film Foundation.

In Norway, 76% of cinemas are open, running at half their capacity, while the number of shows is down 43% from 2019, according to Film & Kino. Jørgen Stensland, Head of Department said cinemas are currently running with a maximum 100 people per screen capacity, with one seat between cohorts. He hopes that the Oslo area which accounts for one third of the market, will open up by the end of the month, and that the full exhibition sector will go back to business in June, “hopefully with one free seat between cohorts and 200 max per screen capacity,” he said.

Stensland said government support to the sector “was good in 2020”, although medium and big-sized private cinemas who applied to ‘stimulation schemes’ only received 50-70% of compensations received last year. “We are lobbying to improve this,” he told nordicfilmandtvnews.com.

Film backlog
For distributors, the prospect of a full roll out of premieres is both exciting and puzzling due to the film backlog. Taking stock of the Finnish situation, Koistinen said: “there will be a big wave of new titles in the coming months, as only 8 new titles were released between January and April, against nearly 100 under normal circumstances.

“With everyone now five months behind on their release schedule, there will be a strong competition each week for a long time, and we will probably end up pushing some of our titles to 2022,” said Scanbox’s Christensen.

Pia Grünler, Nordic Head of Theatrical at SF Studios said her company has around 50 films to release over 30 weeks. ”It will be crowded and we’ll have to fight for space, but I’m not worried”, she said. “Many US studios have moved their titles to give space to others. We just have to balance the releases and find the right spot,” she said, mentioning Warner Bros’ Tom & Jerry, Space Jam 2-A New Legacy, Sony’s Peter Rabbit 2 as tentpole US movies coming up, with Nordic releases lined up for the summer and fall, such as Ninja Thyberg’s Pleasure or Felix Herngren’s Day by Day scheduled for September.

Among independent distributors, Svend Jensen, head of Arthaus in Norway, said his 10-title line up for 2021 was slightly down from the normal 12-13 films a year, due to the uncertainty linked to Covid-19, and to the 'bigger responsibility to release local films" as their "loss of audience cannot be compensated with subsidies", unlike international films, explained Jensen. “Our backlog is luckily not that big, so we are looking for some exciting films to acquire in Cannes,” he said.

Jakob Abrahamsson, managing director of NonStop Entertainment in Sweden has continuously released films during the pandemic, shifting some titles to VOD and delaying other premieres such as the Finnish film Tove, French films DNA, The Big Hit and Oscar-winning The Father. “To some extent we’ve acquired more straight-to-VOD titles, but have still stocked up on forthcoming theatrical titles and classics,” he said.

For SF Studios’ Grünler, ultimately distributors have had to adapt. “We’re learning new things and have watched the audience react to the constantly shifting Covid-situation. But what we’ve seen is that people are definitely longing for going back to the cinemas, so we’re all very hopeful and eager to launch films again.”