A CNC study explains why older audiences are not back yet in cinemas
Due to the COVID crisis, French movie theaters have remained closed for a record of over 300 days between 2020 and 2021, with sanitary restrictions only being lifted for good in March 2022. Unsurprisingly, audiences have been slow in returning to watch films on the big screen. A recent CNC study shows that older audiences (60 and older), in particular, have been slower to go back to movie theaters than very young audiences (15-24) although they were faster than middle-age moviegoers who have deserted film venues (25-50). This survey built on interviews with nearly 1200 French audience members also explores the reasons why audiences were so reluctant to come back to cinemas, and it displays large disparities between older moviegoers and their younger counterparts. People in the 15-34 age range declare that they would now rather watch films on other supports like Video on Demand, and that they find the high price of tickets prohibitive. Half of people older than 60 years old, in contrast, declare that they stopped going to cinemas because they lost this habit during the lockdown. The second main reason why they were reluctant to go back to movie theaters is because they didn’t want to wear a sanitary mask, which was mandatory in cinemas in 2021. The third one, finally, is the fact that few new releases motivated them enough to go back, a fact that has a lot to do with the loss of habit mentioned earlier. Indeed, it resulted in a lack of visibility for upcoming films, since trailers screened before feature films still remain the main source of information on new releases for more than half moviegoers. The study nevertheless shows that ageing audiences have stayed more faithful to national cinema than their younger counterparts: 55% of audience members for French films released in 2021 were older than 50, and most older moviegoers declare that they are eager for more French films to be released in theaters to motivate them to go back to cinemas.