Ibero-American cinema increases its number of spectators by 22.5%

It grew by 16.9 million viewers in 2018 compared to 2017, which represents an increase of 22.5%. Fiction contributes an average of 26.1% of the programming time of television networks.

EGEDA has released its 2019 annual report on the Ibero-American Audiovisual Panorama, in which he also collaborates Ibero-American Federation of Film and Audiovisual Producers (FIPCA). The study analyzes film production and exhibition and the dissemination of fiction on television in 23 Ibero-American countries and its impact in the United States and Europe in 2018.

A significant fact that stands out in the report is that Ibero-American cinema grows by 16.9 million viewers compared to 2017, an increase of 22.5%.

Cinematographic equipment in Latin America in 2018 exceeds 19,700 screens and the global weight of spectator attendance remains around 11%.

Ibero-American cinemas released more than 6,000 productions, of which 22.8% were national (1,432 premieres).

Cinema as a leisure activity continues to offer significant figures in 2018: 870 million tickets sold and more than 3.35 billion dollars in revenue.

The share of viewers of the top-100, in the five-year period 2014-2018, accumulated by American distributors represents 83.2%, compared to 16.8% for independent distributors.

The three most successful Ibero-American productions in 2018 in Ibero-America are: the Brazilian production Nothing to lose (13 million viewers) and the Mexicans We'll see (4.3 million viewers) and Valentina's wedding (3.3 million).

Ibero-American cinema beyond its borders

Ibero-American cinema reinforces its positioning in the main European markets by selling 7.7 million tickets in 2018. The eight markets analyzed are: Germany, Austria, France, Italy, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Russia and Turkey.

Of the 182 releases recorded in these eight markets, the titles with the most presence in the top-10 are: The man who killed Don Quixote in seven markets, call me by your name in 6 markets and everyone knows it, Loving Pablo, Tadeo Jones 2 y The Bookstore in five markets.

The three films that have accumulated more than a million viewers in these European markets are the Spanish ones everyone knows it y Loving Pablo, and the Brazilian call me by your name.

The countries with the highest number of consumers of Ibero-American cinema in 2018 are: France, Italy and the Netherlands. In this case, France repeats the first position of 2017.

Fiction in Latin America

The report compiles data from different sector studies and concludes that, in 74 television channels analyzed in the period 2010-2017, fiction on television has a great impact on programming, with 26.1% of the total broadcast time.

The Telenovela continues to be the premium genre in Latin America with almost 58% of the total titles released in said period and with a great advantage over conventional series that register 25%.

The programmers of the television channels continue to bet decisively on the prime time slot to broadcast fiction. Specifically, the broadcast time that fiction accumulates in this schedule is 44.4% of the total time dedicated to this genre.

Due to the origin of fiction, Mexico, Brazil and Colombia, the three countries with a great tradition in the production of series, continue to be at the head of distribution on all Ibero-American television networks.

Regarding the top-1 of each country in 2017, eight series were leaders in their countries of origin: Brazil (A força do quer), Chile (Forgive our sins), Colombia (Late I met him), Spain (There below), Mexico (Today I am going to change), Peru (VBQ: Everything for fame), Portugal (A heredeira) and Venezuela (To see you better).

Fiction on Spanish television

General consumption of live television, per person and day, stands at 216 minutes in 2018, which is still very significant, since it means spending more than three and a half hours a day in front of the television.

Fiction continues to be premium content since it contributed an average of 34.9% of the audience to all free-to-air television channels.

General television networks have implemented different strategies to reinforce the value of fiction, such as the sale of series to OTT platforms (Netflix, HBO, Amazon) to enhance their internationalization or the creation of their own platforms for on-demand consumption by the user (Playz, LovesTV).

This new edition also publishes interesting sector articles developed by prestigious professionals from Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Spain and Türkiye: Spanish Film Archive and the film archive: the last frontier; The use of analytical tools in film exhibition; Ecuadorian cinema between self-criticism and hope; A general review of Turkey's television series sector; The audiovisual: The king of the Colombian orange economy; Do you watch TV (as usual) or don't you watch it? Study of television channels in Chile; y The news of international festivals.