Initiatives to boost cinemagoing in the UK and the US with discounted tickets resulted in a large spike in admissions this weekend.
The UK’s National Cinema Day on Saturday, September 3 saw 570 participating venues – about two-thirds of UK cinemas across the four regions – charge £3 for all screenings.
According to Comscore, Saturday saw over 1.46 million cinema admissions, which translates to £4.38m in box office revenue.
This is around three times the number of admissions normally seen for the same day in recent pre-Covid years, and up on the 1.34 million achieved for the £1 Cinema Day held in 1997.
High-performing titles on the day included Minions: The Rise Of Gru, DC League Of Super-Pets and Top Gun: Maverick.
The first ever National Cinema Day in the US, also on Saturday, saw 3,000 US cinema locations with around 30,000 screens sell tickets for no more than $3 each.
This resulted in 8.1 million admissions, the highest of the year, and brought in $24.3m according to Comscore. This figure was up 9% on the previous Saturday even with discounted admissions.
The UK’s National Cinema Day was developed by cross-industry body Cinema First and supported by the Film Distributors’ Association and the UK Cinema Association.
The US event was organised by the Cinema Foundation, the donor-supported charitable non-profit created earlier this year by the US National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO).
Screen International’s full UK & Ireland box office report will be published later today.
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