The French Film Commission (CNC) has released video and DVDfigures for 2004 in conjunction with market research group GfK. The numberspoint to the continuing development of the DVD market while video salesdecline.

Overall, the DVD/Video market saw a 32.1% rise in sales toEuros 1.96bn. Sales of DVDs rose 30.4% on 2003 to Euros 1.84bn. VHS salesdropped 53.4% to Euros 114.2m.

The number of DVDs sold rose 56.1%, nearly twice thepercentage increase in revenue. The CNC puts this discrepancy down to the factthat average DVD and VHS prices dropped to Euros 14.92 from Euros 16.66 theprevious year.

The figures show that the French are largely buying featurefilm, with cinema representing 60% of the market for Euros 1.18 billion for DVDand video combined.

French films' share of the market was Euros 253.4m,while US films accounted for Euros 719m.