French films at the international box office: July 2024

The Count of Monte Cristo claimed the lead as the French film the most seen abroad in July. The Soul Eater and Jeanne du Barry took second and third position.

#	Title	No. of Admissions	Box Office Revenues (€)	No. of Prints	No. of Countries	Total Admissions	Total Revenues
1	The Count of Monte Cristo	229,493	2,482,841	394	8	293,593	3,055,093
2	The Soul Eater	119,701	444,957	539	1	191,539	723,132
3	Jeanne du Barry	90,898	395,312	110	5	1,953,294	10,075,454
4	A Little Something Extra	67,894	695,379	77	3	517,903	5,396 512
5	Out of Season	56,015	449,531	157	5	155,798	1,327,272
6	Around the World in 80 Days	35,512	164,912	0	1	1,774,388	10,656,843
7	Marguerite's Theorem	31,506	283,189	216	5	108,078	830,178
8	The Taste of Things	29,726	219,979	136	10	1,408,256	11,549,367
9	Sidonie in Japan	29,673	274,863	144	5	91,630	709,402
10	Oh La La	28,471	235,745	114	7	711,743	6,251,342
11	Zak & Wowo, la légende de Lendarys	23,855	114,570	218	3	60,912	242,522
12	Juliette in Spring	19,977	189,389	111	3	21,906	215,322
13	Maria Montessori	19,500	182,450	100	7	422,483	3 620 436
14	Mars Express	17,423	82,258	133	3	58,291	372 129
15	Sweet Little Things	16,634	141,896	111	2	159,295	1 433 155
16	And the Party Goes on	16,551	99,064	71	4	80,950	536 578
17	Mayhem!	15,864	42,552	150	1	103,659	552 757
18	Anatomy of a Fall	13,798	87,956	40	7	4,911,096	35 572 786
19	The Second Act	13,131	71,127	12	4	39,599	314 111
20	Last Summer	11,100	104,112	33	5	79,894	574 015

Box office results for French films abroad remain fragile

French films registered 1.5 million admissions and generated €11.8 million in ticket sales in foreign theaters in July. Although one film sold more than 100,000 tickets (three in total), only almost 20,000 more tickets were sold than in June, the month with the lowest monthly attendance since September 2022. The comparison with the levels of July 2023 – 3.5 million tickets sold, including 1.9 million for Ladybug & Cat Noir Awakening and 0.5 million for Jeanne du Barry – and July 2022 – 2.1 million, including 0.5 million for Serial (Bad) Weddings 3 – is even more jarring.
As for the number of films in theaters and new releases, they were in line with those recorded in July 2023 and July 2022.

France retained its position on the world stage, but July witnessed a slowdown in the renewal of the films on offer, particularly in the area of powerhouse titles. The Count of Monte Cristo and A Little Something Extra, among others, both have what it takes to achieve strong international careers, but the timing of their key launches tends towards the fall; hence the releases are not concentrated around the French release date and are more spread out over time. And the gap since the success of Anatomy of a Fall and Autumn and the Black Jaguar, which characterised the start of the year, is widening. Since April, the biggest monthly French success has been a minority-French animated production: Robot Dreams has topped the rankings three times, with the exception of May (Panda Bear in Africa).

As far as films with majority-French financing are concerned, the podium looks completely different. A Little Something Extra, which led the way last month, exited from the top three but broke the 500,000 admissions barrier outside France. For the past three months, the comedy has shone in the top 10 in Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland, where it is also the biggest French success of the current year, with sales of 317,000 (Vertigo, €2.94 million in box office revenues) and 164,000 (Praesens, €2.18 million) tickets respectively. The crown was taken by the aforementioned Count of Monte Cristo, which made its first appearance in the June top 5. 300,000 foreign moviegoers have already discovered it on the big screen, including 150,000 Belgian & Luxembourg moviegoers (Alternative, €1.63 million), 60,000 Swiss (Pathé, €0.89 million), and 23,000 Bulgarians (Pro, €0.16 million). The film is well established in the weekly top 5 in all three markets. By chance of the release calendar, Jeanne du Barry returned to the top 3, buoyed by fine performances in Mexico (Canibal, 74,000 admissions and €0.33 million) and Colombia (Babilla, 16,000 and €0.06 million): it thus exceeded 2 million tickets sold internationally. Chosen by almost 200,000 Russians (Global, €0.72 million), a newcomer even took second place in July's top 10: The Soul Eater. Other notable titles include Oh La La (10th), Out of Season (5th), and Marguerite's Theorem (7th), which respectively racked up over 700,000, 150,000, and 100,000 admissions outside France, a threshold soon to be reached by Sidonie in Japan (9th). The Taste of Things is the only film in the top ten to be released in 10 markets.

Belgium, Germany, and Russia: the top three territories in July 2024

Europe remained the leading geographic zone for French cinema (69.9% of monthly admissions), with the Central and Eastern region offering twice as many admissions as in June thanks to The Soul Eater and Monte Cristo. The other dynamic zone was Latin America (+71%), with Jeanne du Barry accounting for half the score. As for North America and Asia, while their market indicators were green the previous month, they shifted to red in July. Once again, the minority-French film Robot Dreams was the only French title to attract more than 100,000 moviegoers outside Europe. The top trio of territories by admissions changed, with Belgium & Luxembourg, Germany, and Russia joining the list. 4 foreign territories (4 in June, 8 in May, 7 in April, 14 in March, 13 in February and 6 in January) offered more than 100,000 admissions each to French productions in July 2024 (the top trio, plus Mexico).

Comedy, adventure, and drama took center stage

In July, comedy/drama retained its crown as the favorite genre internationally (0.4 million viewers, 27.1% of the monthly total), but lost a quarter of its June audience. Whereas, the two genres that took second and third place in the rankings attracted more viewers: action/adventure/police/thriller (24.6%) and drama (23.0%), as did biopic/war/history (8.2%). Majority-French productions (72.4% of total admissions) and French-language productions (82.0%) continued to account for the lion's share of the month's admissions. On the other hand, it was minority-French financed and foreign-language productions that saw a drop in attendance (-35.8% and -4.6% respectively). Concluding this report, over 0.3 million admissions went to arthouse films (21.4% of the monthly total), led by Jeanne du Barry, Marguerite's Theorem, and The Taste of Things.

> This report can be downloaded in PDF format below (French version only).

> This report is based on results recorded on August 7, 2024. Since our statistics for film releases are continuously being updated, the graphics generated automatically on our website will differ from the chart featured in this article.