Movie theatres look to rescue by autumn domestic first-runs

Multiplex cinemas going up all over Finland

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By Katri Kallionpää
     
      Finland's movie theatre operators are in suspense. What has them nervously gripping their seats is not the latest action flick or summer teen-horror movie, but whether or not the upcoming autumn season of domestic releases will turn box-office receipts around from the downward spiral of the first six months of the year.
      Cinema attendances have been going south in Finland over the past couple of years, just as they have declined elsewhere in the world.
     
For Finnkino, which can claim just over half of all movie theatre seats in Finland, the downturn began already last year. In the first two quarters of 2005, the fall was around 8% relative to the first six months of last year.
      Reijo Jämes, Finnkino's VP for Marketing and Programmes, confirms that the phenomenon is an international one. The worst attrition has taken place this year in Italy and France, where attendances have slumped by 18% and 15% respectively.
      As recently as 2002 and 2003, aggregate attendances at Finnish cinemas were around 7.7 million, but in 2004 this had slipped to 6.9 million. A Finn makes an average of around one and a half trips to the cinema each year, which is conspicuously fewer than the three-times-a-year European mean, not to mention the five annual visits of American movie audiences.
     
Movie theatres are now waiting with fingers crossed for the fall première of the new Harry Potter and a half-dozen Finnish first-runs to come and save the day.
      "We may not quite reach last year's levels, but as things look at present we will not fall far short of them, either", forecasts Harri Ahokas, who heads the Distribution Department at SES, the Finnish Film Foundation.
      Jämes from Finnkino believes the autumn will turn the figures back upwards. "Seasonal fluctuations are part and parcel of the movie business", he points out.
     
A cinema ticket costs an average of EUR 7.30 in Finland, putting the country among the half-dozen most expensive places to see a film in Europe.
      "On a weekend evening, a ticket to a show at Helsinki's Tennispalatsi multiplex will cost you 10 euros, but it is possible to see films for a lot less if you go to a matinee or in midweek, or if you use a serial ticket or take advantage of campaign special offers", notes Jämes.
      According to Ahokas, the situation from the viewers' perspective has improved since the 1990s, when there was precious little competition between the cinema operators.
     
One big question is whether viewing and downloading movies from the internet or the spread of digitial TV receivers are going to have a long-term effect on traditional cinema attendances.
      Ahokas takes the view that the new channels and technology will have an impact in the shorter term, but that after the initial novelty wears off the situation will stabilise itself once more. This is what happened earlier, when VHS videocassettes came onto the market in large numbers.
      "Right now the innovations that are grabbing people's attention have emerged specifically in the home-viewing environment: DVD and the approaching video-on-demand services are the modern success stories", says Ahokas.
     
There also seems to be some significance attached to the sort of surroundings in which a film is shown.
      People increasingly want to merge their movie experience with eating and drinking, with cinemas turning into entertainment complexes.
      A good example is the runaway success of Tennispalatsi ["Tennis Palace", after the former use of the premises] in downtown Helsinki. This 14-screen multiplex with a total capacity of around 2,700 was opened in 1999, and it now draws in around 1.5 million cinema-goers a year, a record for Northern Europe. In addition to the cinemas, there are cafés, restaurants, kiosks, and a branch of the City Art Museum under the same roof.
     
A similar crowd-pulling act has been pulled off in Kajaani, where Matila Röhr Productions, owned by Marko Röhr and Ilkka Matila, opened a new 3-screen cinema in September 2004. During its first three months in operation, more people went to the movies in Kajaani than had turned out during the whole of 2003.
      This year Kajaani's Bio Rex is anticipating aggregate attendance figures of more than 70,000, which is twice the city's population.
      The approach is being duplicated all over the country. Savon Kinot will open a new complex in Joensuu in September. In the course of the next two years, Matila Röhr Productions will be opening a cinema in Hämeenlinna and Finnkino are building one in Oulu.
      Finnkino is also planning new multi-screen ventures in Lahti and Kuopio.
     
Finnkino is a subsidiary of Rautakirja, which is in turn part of the SanomaWSOY Group, to which Helsingin Sanomat also belongs.
      After Finnkino, the second-largest share of the Finnish cinema screening market is taken by Sandrew Metronome. The Finnish operator is part of a Nordic media corporation of the same name, owned jointly by the Norwegian company Schibsted and the Swedish foundation Anders Sandrews Stiftelse.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 20.8.2005

More on this subject:
 An autumn season full of Finnish releases

Links:
  Finnkino (in Finnish, shows current releases)
  Sandrew Metronome (in Finnish, shows current releases)
  Matila Röhr Productions
  Tennispalatsi, the largest cinema complex in Northern Europe
  Finnish Film Foundation, SES

KATRI KALLIONPÄÄ / Helsingin Sanomat
katri.kallionpaa@hs.fi