Nigerians spent N636.2m in the cinemas in January 2022, a 28% decline from December

With total accumulated gross earnings of N636,213,517 in January, the box office witnessed an over 28 per cent decline in the cinemas’ revenue, down from the over N887 million recorded in December.

Reports from the Cinema Exhibitors Association of Nigeria (CEAN) have revealed that Hollywood’s Spiderman: No Way Home dominated the Nigerian box office in January as moviegoers spent a gross accumulation of over N636.2 million on movie tickets.

The report indicated that the Sony studio movie made a total gross of N212,153,240 in January to retain its top position, which began last week of December 2021.

In the last week of the year, which also signifies its first week of top-place dominance, Spiderman No way homemade a gross of 230,131,949 to surpass other contenders like the Nollywood’s Christmas in Miami and Aki & Pawpaw.

While this run has been impressive, the breakdown of the movie revenue into weekly grossing shows that this latest Marvel outing has slowly begun to lose dominance. Spiderman, No way Home made an accumulated gross of N9,317, 876 in the last days of January, a fractional 7.8 per cent increase from the N119,704,266 it made in the year’s first week.

The movie is currently displaced to the third position as Nollywood’s Dinner at My Place and Empire Moonfall, which just began their run on the charts, have been, of late, rather impressive.

28 per cent decline from December figures

These figures are, however, 45 per cent higher than the N349,706,460 grossed from November of last year.

The decline in these revenue figures is not unexpected as there has also been a proportionate 23.5 per cent decline in the number of cinemas attendance from the 455,984 attendance recorded in December.

Of course, the surge in the December attendance volume was in relation to the festivity, as moviegoers had ample time to spare caused by the yuletide.

Nollywood continues to hold a significant position

Although Hollywood films that aired in Nigerian cinemas had a phenomenal run in January, their Nigerian Nollywood counterparts fared reasonably well in comparison.

On average in January, Spiderman: No Way Home had total revenue of N212,153,240. per cent of the monthly gross, but these figures were preceded by Nollywood’s Christmas in Miami, which also enjoyed significant attention. 

The movie, distributed by FilmOne studio, had a gross accumulation of N129,658,656, accounting for 20.38 per cent of the month’s gross, but this success was soon followed by another Hollywood movie, the Disney Kingsman, with a 9 per cent gross of the month’s total.

Nollywood movies have begun to kick in hot for the new month’s top-grossing movies and have quickly occupied the first and fourth positions on the chart, with Empire’s Moonfall and Sony’s Spiderman retaining the second and third positions, respectively.