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2006 Box Office Totals in Canada
Following are the box office totals for the Top 10 Canadian films and the Top 10 films in Canada in 2006 (through Nov. 9), along with total Canadian box office results for 2005 and 2006 (as of Oct. 27, 2006).
Box office just average in ’06
In 2006, Alliance Atlantis’ Bon Cop, Bad Cop became the all-time highest-grossing domestic film at the local box office, but overall market share for Canuck films stood below Canadian Heritage’s 5% target and Quebec’s New Wave stalled for the first time in five years.
Black draws a crowd, Degrassi numbers slip
The controversial life and times of media mogul Conrad Black were on full display in the two-hour CTV MOW Shades of Black, which drew an average 864,000 viewers on Dec. 4, peaking at 925,000. Pretty good, especially considering the Screen Door project, made with its U.K. partner Box TV, was up against the fall finale of Global’s Heroes in its second hour. The U.S. superhero drama nabbed 1.4 million viewers in its Monday 9 p.m. timeslot, finishing with a solid 1.3 million season average.
Top 20 TV programs
Top 20 TV Programs tracks ratings for the top 20 television shows in Canada for the period Nov. 27-Dec. 3, 2006.
Fest faves dominate Top 10
The titles in Canada’s Top Ten – representing the year’s best domestic films – read like a program book for the Toronto International Film Festival, with all but one – director Mike Clattenburg’s comedy Trailer Park Boys The Movie – having played at TIFF this year.
JFL looks to corner the comedy market
The main objective of the new Just For Laughs website may be to get a laugh, but it’s also the first step in the company’s larger initiative to corner the online comedy market.
Sold!
* The Score has paid US$3.1 million for a three-year deal to air English Premier League soccer, starting in fall 2007.
People
* Cookie Jar Entertainment has named Wiebke Hoefer as director of European sales, based in Paris. The company also tapped Susan Richter as VP of U.S. licensing.
CBC News switches gears again
CBC is dropping its current plan of attack for suppertime news programming, and in February will axe its national newscast Canada Now to make room for expanded, hour-long local news.
Docs look to the future
Gerry Flahive (Souvenir of Canada, This Beggar’s Description) is a documentary producer at the National Film Board in Toronto.
Readership poll results
For our readers, the Big Deal was the big deal in 2006. In a recent online Playback poll asking ‘What is the industry story of the year?’, 38% of respondents chose Bell Globemedia buying CHUM. This was followed by the CBC’s recent struggles (23%), the record-breaking box office for Bon Cop, Bad Cop (20%), the growth of new media (10%), the CRTC over-the-air TV review (6%) and union conflicts (3%).
Web not Cancon savior
The year winds down following plenty of heated talk from broadcasters, cablers and the production community, each pleading its case at the over-the-air TV hearing in Gatineau. The CRTC, meanwhile, is left to mull over a number of decisions of great consequence to the industry in 2007 and for years to come.
Clarification
A Nov. 27 story stated that, in their IPA negotiations, ACTRA and the CFTPA had agreed on performers’ rest time between shooting days. Although ACTRA had stated that the current 11-hour time frame would not change, it is still looking for the definition of turnaround time to be changed to ‘door-to-door’ from ‘set-to-set.’
Thorne picks Daisies
Halifax: Just three days after Poor Boy’s Game was in the can, Chaz Thorne went straight to work on his next picture – trading the docklands of Halifax for the rustic splendor of Nova Scotia’s countryside to make the dark comedy Pushing Up Daisies.
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