Agreat year for local product in Turkey in 2004 was capped by comedy smash G.O.R.A.which now ranks as the highest grossing film of the last 20 years in theterritory having grossed $17.4m (TKL 24.5bn).

Fiveof the year's top six releases were local productions with only Troy, inthird place, preventing a clean sweep. It proved a particularly strong year forWarner Bros which handled four of the top five US releases in the territory aswell as the top two local titles.

G.O.R.A.,a science-fiction parody in which a Turkish man is abducted by aliens, alsolaunched in Germany, the UK and Belgium and had grossed $19m internationally toDec 12.

Itsperformance beat out 2001 comedy Vizontele at the local box office forthe record. G.O.R.A.'s director Omer Faruk Sorak co-directed Vizontele,while both films starred Cem Yilmaz. The sequel to the former champ, VizonteleTuuba, ranked second for the year with a $11.3m (TKL 16bn) after playingfor 34 weeks following its launch in January.

Allof the top five films of 2004 passed the one million admission mark in theterritory but only Vizontele Tuuba and G.O.R.A. managed twomillion. G.O.R.A. had already passed 3.5m after just four weeks onrelease and is expected to reach 4.5m by the end of its run.

Whilecomedies ruled amongst local films, historical epics proved the order of theday amongst the Hollywood fare in the territory. Troy led the pack asthe only non-Turkish film to break the 10bn lira and 1m admissions barriers,with more than double the gross ($7.05m) of second placed US title The LastSamurai ($3.5m). The Passion Of The Christ ranked as the sixthhighest US earner with $2.4m (TKL 3.4bn) from 610,000 admissions.

Worldwidebox office leader for 2004, Shrek 2 finished just seventh amongst USproduct in the country with 553,000 admissions recording a gross of $2.3m (TKL3.3bn) after 15 weeks on release.

Turkey Top Five Local Releases 2004
G.O.R.A. (Warner Bros) 3.6m $17.4m
Vizontele Tuuba (Warner Bros) 2.89m $11.3m
Hababam Sinifi Merhaba (Ozen Film) 1.58m $6.2m
Neredesin Firuze (UIP) 1.06m $4.45m
Okul (Ozen Film) 0.84m $3.2m
Source: Birfilm

Turkey Top Five US Releases 2004
Troy (Warner Bros) 1.69m $7m
The Last Samurai (Warner Bros) 0.83m $3.5m
Spider-Man 2 (Warner Bros) 0.75m $3.1m
The Day After Tomorrow (Ozen Film) 0.65m $2.8m
Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban (Warner Bros) 0.63m $2.5m
Source: Birfilm