Five months after its first release outside France, Portrait of a Lady on Fire crossed the symbolic threshold of one million admissions in thirty overseas territories: 1.04 million spectators and €7.4 million in box office revenues!
In the USA, the film has accumulated $2.47 million, being around 270,000 admissions! Last December, Portrait of a Lady on Fire had an exclusive week-long run in Los Angeles and New York, generating $118,500 in box office revenues (equalling around 13,000 admissions), buoyed by an impressive average per screen (almost $60,000). This placed it among the best averages achieved by a foreign language film on limited release in the United States in twenty years. The film was released on February 14 in twenty-two theaters, which grew to 130 the following week, then to 268, and it reached and crossed the symbolic threshold of one million dollars in box office revenues in only ten days! Taking into account the "Oscar effect" which has benefited Parasite and the difficulties foreign language films encounter in getting access to USA screens, exhibition and a score on this scale were by no means a given.
In South Korea, the "artbuster," as it has been named in the local press, started at 5th place in the rankings in mid-January. Since then, it has attracted 141,000 spectators (€823,000) and has already overtaken such French language successes as La Vie en rose (2007, 113,000 admissions and €436,500), The Artist (2012, 120,500 admissions and €644,500), The Bélier Family (2015, 122,000 admissions and €743,500), and Priceless (2008, 129,500 admissions and €425,000).
Céline Sciamma's latest film, which rose to rank among the top 10 titles in eleven territoires the week of its release, has managed to find its public in other markets where foreign language productions traditionally have difficulty staking a claim:
- 81,000 admissions (€678,500) in The Netherlands
- 47,000 admissions (€423,000) in Australia
- 41,000 admissions (€105,000) in Turkey
- 28,000 admissions (€281,000) in Sweden
- 27,000 admissions (€290,500) in Finland
- 22,000 admissions (€267,500) in Norway
Portrait of a Young Lady on Fire, which has also appealed to 102,000 Italians (€544,500) and 89,000 Germans (€700,500), will continue its international tour in the United Kingdom and in several Latin American countries in the weeks to come.
It is the second French film to assemble more than one million spectators in the international arena in 2020, after An Officer and a Spy (1.22 million spectators and €7.91 million in box office revenues in fifteen foreign markets).
