The crisis in Turkish cinema

Turkish cinema

According to the Habertürk publication, the Turkish film industry that has never really quite successful at the box office, was on the verge of collapse. In the first half of 2019 the number of spectators fell by 10 million compared with the first half of last year, while revenues declined by 98 million lira. Thus, the audience loss is 45.1% compared with 2018, the loss of revenue is 35.2%.

This is the lowest figure in the last 10 years. The reason for this is a crisis between distributors and producers that has led to a delay in the release of major movie hits expected by viewers. There are no hits in cinemas so the viewer does not go to cinemas. It seems that the new law on cinema that was adopted on February 1, 2019, either turned out to be ineffective or was passed too late. The only serious success is the premiere of Organize İşler: Sazan Sarmalı, however, it was somewhat blurred by the quick release of the film on the Netflix platform.

However, not everything is so bad. In the second half of 2019, the expected release of several new movies is expected. Karakomik Filmler will be released in cinemas on October 18, Recep İvedik 6 on November 8, 2019, and Mucize Aşk on December 6. Perhaps this will help overcome the crisis. In addition, according to statistics, the number of Turkish films in the box office over the past five years has increased by 77.33%, 56% of viewers preferred to watch domestic products in cinemas. The number of cinemas has increased by 31.7%. One can only hope that the quantity will soon turn into quality.