Here’s some (admittedly qualified) good news to start the New Year. It’s a sign, or perhaps a hope, that an important part of our global cultural life may have begun to recover.
In some countries tens of millions of us still want to watch movies where they were meant to be seen – in the cinema. Up-to-date figures are being calculated right now but the signs are that more of us understand that great movies are made for the big screen, not for laptops, mobile phones or even home televisions.
In some countries, cinemas have begun to bounce back. The coronavirus pandemic was catastrophic for movie houses, theatres and live entertainment. Sport generally recovered quickly, but many cinemas closed forever. In the UK, after a post-pandemic drop of about 30 per cent in cinema audiences, last year’s figures rose to 126.5 million admissions. That’s a small but significant 2.3 per cent rise from 2023 although it’s still well below 2019's pre-pandemic total of 176.1 million admissions.
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