Nearly 110,000 Italian spectators discovered The Wolf and the Lion during its opening week starting January 20. This fine score allowed it to take first place in the Italian rankings, dethroning Spiderman from its five-week reign! Since The Girl with a Bracelet in Spain (Surtsey Films), it's been almost a year since a French film has topped the top 10 in a non-French speaking country.
In 2019, it was in Italy that Mia and the White Lion achieved its best performance outside France (Eagle Pictures—925,000 admissions and €5.73 million in box office revenues). The latest feature by Gilles De Maistre (photo), The Wolf and the Lion, was hence eagerly awaited by local audiences.
The Italian launch of the film garnered the second highest number of admissions for a majority-French production abroad since the beginning of the pandemic, after that of Yakari, A Spectacular Journey in Germany (Leonine—154,000 admissions and €1.02 million).
The following weekend, January 26, more than 200 additional screens were added, for a total of 777; The Wolf and the Lion's attendance dropped by only 13% and, on Sunday, January 30, it even had the luxury of topping the charts despite competition from Nightmare Alley.
Already released in about 30 foreign markets, The Wolf and the Lion has tallied 664,000 admissions and €3.63 million in box office revenues, including 209,000 in Poland (Kino Swiat—€722,000), 141,000 in Spain (Tripictures—€853,000), and 46,000 in Hungary (Prorom Entertainment— €174,000). It has already featured in 15 different top 10 rankings, and been among the top three three times (#1 in Italy and #2 in Lithuania and Poland), and its international tour will continue in Germany (StudioCanal), Austria (Constantin Film), the USA (Blue Fox Entertainment), and Quebec (Sphère Films (ex-mk2 Mile End))
It should be noted that the Italian top 10 included another French film. Aline, the Voice of Love was released in 345 theaters and took eighth place with 28,000 spectators (Lucky Red/Universal —€177,000). No other French-language, majority-French production had attracted so many moviegoers during the week of its release in the peninsula since the theaters reopened in mid-May 2021.
