A total of 19 films were released for public screening during the three-month period and 9.78 million people went to the movies, according to data retrieved from www.panel.cinemashahr.ir, the official “Iranian cinema box office website” that provides detailed information on box office earnings to the public. The site became operational on Feb. 25, 2019.
The number of moviegoers increased by 1.66% compared with the three months of last fiscal year.
The average cinema ticket price during the period under review stood at 116,000 rials ($0.88), noticeably up by 30,310 rials ($0.23) or 35.41% year-on-year, according to Financial Tribune.
Therefore, it can be implied from the data that the solid rise in box office earnings during the period under review stems from the rise in ticket prices and not in the number of moviegoers.
More than half of the box office earnings belonged to only three films, namely "6.5 Per Meter" directed by Saeed Roustayi with 262.23 billion rials ($2 million), "Rahman 1400" directed by Manouchehr Hadi with 218.91 billion rials ($1.67 million) and "Texas 2" directed by Masoud Atyabi with 173.16 billion rials ($1.32 million). The three films earned 654.3 billion rials ($4.99 million) altogether.
Figures also show box office earnings during the first Iranian month (March 21-April 20) stood at 573.57 billion rials ($4.37 million), registering an increase of 34.7% compared with last year’s similar month.
This is while the earnings amounted to 266.63 billion rials ($2.03 million) during the second Iranian month (April 21-May 21), indicating a decline of 1.88% year-on-year and a decline of 53.51% month-on-month.
Box office sales during the third Iranian month (May 22-June 21) totaled 293.79 billion rials ($2.24 million), up by 132.81% YOY and 10.19% MOM.
Iranian box offices earned 2.4 trillion rials ($18.32 million) during the last Iranian year (ended March 20, 2019), to register an increase of 600 billion rials ($4.58 million) or about 25% compared to earnings in the year before.
A report by Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture shows that 79 films were released in theaters last year.
Iranian movie theaters sold tickets worth 810 billion rials ($6.18 million) in spring, 610 billion rials ($4.65 million) in summer, 530 billion rials ($4.04 million) in fall and 360 billion rials ($2.74 million) in winter.
Figures indicate that the movie "Centipede" directed by Abolhassan Davoodi was the highest grossing movie of the year earning over 370 billion rials ($2.82 million) and attracting 4.21 million viewers. These figures indicate it became the all-time highest-grossing film of the Iranian cinema.
On March 19, director-general of Iranian Organization of Cinema and Audiovisual Affairs, Mohammad Reza Faraji, announced the decision to increase ticket prices for the current fiscal year that began on March 21, 2019.
Accordingly, movie theaters in the capital city have been categorized into four groups with ticket prices ranging from 50,000 rials ($0.38) to 180,000 rials ($1.37).
Amir Hossein Alamolhoda, an expert on cultural economics, says the number of movie theaters in Iran is far from global standards in that currently there is one cinema for every 180,000 people in the country, while the global standard is one cinema for 10,000.
According to the same source, Iranian cinemas attracted more than 28 million people last year, which shows a 22% increase compared to that of the year before.
Each Iranian goes to the movies 0.3 times per year on average, according to a report by the Persian daily, Donya-e-Eqtesad.