French films at the international box office: March 2017

18 APRIL 2017

In March, two arthouse dramatic titles appealed to European and American audiences, while a biopic launched its career in German theaters.

In the past month, 6 majority French productions tallied more than 100,000 admissions abroad.
#	Title	Admissions	Box Office Revenues (€)	No. of Prints	No. of Countries	Total Admissions
1	Elle	308,764	2,243,523	465	17	1,264,970
2	Personal Shopper	181,832	1,111,273	381	11	212,939
3	The Young Karl Marx	155,202	1,161,906	296	2	155,202
4	Two is a Family	128,972	1,087,051	258	5	2,264,990
5	Alibi.com	113,174	503,902	374	4	139,087
6	Miss Sloane	109,625	682,856	200	7	563,576
7	Penny Pincher!	89,930	542,676	311	5	601,168
8	Raw	82,798	557,103	208	4	82,798
9	R.A.I.D. Special Unit	69,735	523,829	50	3	291,967
10	The Red Turtle	61,837	474,302	425	9	378,889
11	Mune	56,133	238,991	147	1	2,116,656
12	Irreplaceable	33,508	158,652	85	7	669,357
13	Agnus Dei / The Innocents	25,891	185,244	52	3	518,660
14	Rock'n Roll	23,690	192,892	42	2	54,662
15	This Is Our Land	23,224	168,137	32	2	23,224
16	Step by Step	23,133	219,593	36	2	23,133
17	Mr & Mrs Adelman	23,046	212,928	27	2	23,046
18	You Choose !	22802	189,151	39	2	22,802
19	The Student and Mr. Henri	20,331	117,222	48	2	661,985
20	From the Land of the Moon	19,004	134,536	64	2	87,276,

British theaters provided a fine suprise in March. Elle took 10^th place at the box office during its opening week, with nearly €400,000 in box office revenues generated from 62 prints (being around 59,000 admissions), which was the week's best result for a non-American film. It was also the best launch recorded by a French-language film in this territory since 2012, the year that was marked by the success of The Artist (€9.8 million in box office revenues, being around 1.5 admissions) and The Intouchables (€2 million B.O. / 318,000 admissions). After three weeks in theaters, Elle proudly crossed the symbolic threshold of 100,000 British spectators.

The winner of the 2017 César Award for Best Film also arrived in Argentina during March. The third French film to be released in the territory since the beginning of the year, after Monsieur Chocolat and Frantz, Elle launched its career positively by attracting more than 16,000 spectators from 30 prints in its opening week, for a total of 28,000 admissions to date - a score that only two French-language films managed to reach last year: Francofonia (36,000 admissions, the top French success in the region in 2016), and Irreplaceable (30,500 admissions). Another performance to be noted this month, while the 7^th edition of the Rendez-vous – Nuovo cinema francese has just been inaugurated, Elle rose to 6^th place at the Italian box office during its opening week, with 80,000 spectators present in 134 theaters (€487,000 in box office revenues). Backed by this fine average of 600 admissions per print, Paul Verhoeven's thriller achieved the week's the second best performance per screen (only the blockbuster Beauty and the Beast did better – 1,400 admissions). Less than a year after its first international release, Elle crossed the million admissions mark in foreign theaters (€9 million in box office revenues), with more than 276,000 admissions garnered in the USA ($2.3 million), 146,000 in Spain (€0.9 million), and 137,000 in Germany (€1.1 million).

Personal Shopper also got off to a fine start in Mexico in March. Released on 47 prints, the film rose to 10^th place at the local box office during its opening week, with nearly 35,000 spectators seduced (€95,000 in box office revenues). This is an encouraging average per print (745 admissions) for its director Olivier Assayas, who has realized his best launch in this territory, with a score twice as high as that achieved by Clouds of Sils Maria in 2014 (17,000 admissions from 36 prints during its opening week). After two weeks on screen, the film has tallied more than 47,000 admissions and €130,000 in box office revenues. Promising news also come in from two English-language markets this past month: in the United Kingdom, Personal Shopper earned more than £232,000 from a maximum of 65 screens after 2 weeks out on release, being around 35,000 admissions. The thriller also launched its career well in the USA. Initially distributed in 15 theaters, the film's run increased to 41 screens in its second week, then 100 by its third, and spectators are still flocking ($633,000 generated in total – around 75,000 admissions).

After the incredible success of his documentary I Am Not Your Negro in the USA ($6.7 million in box office revenues, being around 795,000 admissions), Raoul Peck's latest fiction feature, The Young Karl Marx, shone at the German box office for its very first theatrical release. Distributed on 267 prints, the film attracted 70,000 spectators during its opening week (€0.5 million in box office revenues) and took 10^th place in the local rankings. Four weeks later, the film had garnered almost 150,000 admissions and more than €1.1 million in box office revenues in the territory. Also released at the end of the month in Austria, The Young Karl Marx brought together more than 5,000 spectators for 30 prints during its opening week (€42,000 in box office revenues). Still without a release date for France, the film will release at the beginning of May in German-speaking Switzerland and at the beginning of September in Belgium.