Lion King and Aladdin attracted most cinema audiences in Malta last year

The two most-watched films at the cinema in 2019 were the Lion King and Aladdin, both Disney productions, figures released by the National Statistics Office show.

The Lion King attracted 10.4% of all total admissions in 2019, followed by Aladdin which attracted 7.2% and the Joker which attracted 5.5% of total admissions.

The NSO said that in 2019, there were six cinemas operating in Malta and Gozo, with a total of 28 screens and a seating capacity of 5,762. 

The figures show that 409 films were screened with a total of 29,184 screenings and an average of 71 screenings per film. Last year, cinemas registered 748,568 admissions.

Maltese productions had 13,942 admissions with a total gross box office of €99,000 in 650 screenings. On the other hand, foreign productions had 734,626 admissions with a total gross box office of €5 million in 28,534 screenings.

The majority of cinemagoers, 91.2%, watched films originating from the United States. On the other hand, Maltese productions attracted 1.9% of the total number of admissions.

Admissions to 3D movies accounted for 18% of the total, while 81% of admissions were for digital non-3D films

A total of 705 film shows were projected in 2019, of which 82.7% or 583 film shows were first-time releases.

Last year, 238 fiction films were screened in cinemas across Malta and Gozo.

In terms of age classification, most films shown in Maltese cinemas were rated as ‘15’ and ‘12A’. From all the films projected in 2019, 26.9% were rated as ‘15’, while 25.9% were rated as ‘12A’. On the other hand, 3.4% were rated as ’18.’

Cinemas were found to be employing an average of 134 persons, of which 77.6% were engaged on a part-time basis.