Oscar winners, box office bankers and comedians – cinema is set for a strong year

Following the 85th Academy Awards ceremony last month, Digital Cinema Media’s (DCM) Simon Rees shares his highlights and looks ahead to what promises to be another strong year for the film industry.

The great, the talented and the beautiful of the world’s film industry gathered just over a week ago for the 85th Academy Awards, otherwise known as the Oscars. Some surprises were in store on an unpredictable evening, with the top categories (Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor and Best Supporting Actress), all going to different films. This demonstrates the variety and calibre of the films and acting talent in contention this year.

As DCM is a partner of BAFTA, I was lucky enough to attend the BAFTA awards a few weeks ago with Jenny Biggam, CEO of The7Stars, where we brushed shoulders with Oscar winners Anne Hathaway (Les Misérables) and George Clooney (Argo) on the red carpet – a far more glitzy experience than I’m used to.

Unfortunately, Daniel Day-Lewis was already in his seat, but watching him pick up the Best Actor BAFTA award and now an Oscar for a record-breaking third time was a highlight for me. He previously won an Oscar in 1989 for My Left Foot and in 2008 for There Will Be Blood and has now surely secured his place amongst the all-time acting greats.

Special Oscar recognition also went to Adele for taking the award for Best Original Song for Skyfall, the first Bond theme to win an Academy Award – which was fitting in the 50th year of the franchise.

Although Bond was overlooked as a nominee for Best Film at the Oscars, Sony will take a lot of consolation in its current status as the UK’s biggest film of all time, bursting through the magic £100 million barrier and smashing the record set by James Cameron’s Avatar in the process.

Fuelled by Skyfall and other titles such as The Dark Knight Rises and Marvel’s Avengers Assemble, 2012 was a blockbuster year for cinema with UK and Ireland Box Office ticket sales exceeding the £1 billion mark for the fourth consecutive year. This equates to more than 172 million admissions in the UK.

January’s admissions totalled 17.1 million, up a spectacular 26% from January 2012. By any measure that is a terrific start to the year and it marks the biggest January this century. The Box Office for the month was £122.8 million, up an even bigger 36% on last year and that total would have made it the second highest grossing month of 2012.

This terrific result was propelled by the fantastic Box Office of Les Misérables. Django Unchained also posted a strong performance, becoming Quentin Tarantino’s most successful film in the UK. Tarantino deservedly won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, along with Christoph Waltz for Best Supporting Actor – the second time in three years he has won the category in a Tarantino movie.

The rest of the year is looking to be just as strong. In the Blockbuster club (predicted to take more than £15 million at the Box Office), there is the triple threat of Oz: The Great and Powerful 3D, Iron Man 3 3D and Star Trek Into Darkness 3D, all in the first half of the year. As a massive sci-fi fan, I can’t wait for the new Star Trek film, as well as Pacific Rim, Oblivion and After Earth.

Later in the year, top titles such as Man of Steel, The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, are all set to be big hits.

With no landmark entertainment events in the UK in 2013, such as the Olympics or the Queen’s Jubilee, cinema has a much stronger claim on people’s entertainment time. As consumers, we will seek appointment-to-view with standout events, be that flagship TV programmes, must-read print editorial or major cinema releases.

Whatever your audience, in a media environment where attention is increasingly diverted and distracted, people will demand the sanctity of more involved media.