Animation sector takes biggest hit as US buyer retreat dents French export market
Emilia Schule and Louis Cunningham in Marie Antoinette
Revenues from international sales of French content dipped in 2023 with the animation sector taking a particularly painful hit, as challenging market conditions made global buyers less likely to open their chequebooks.
Sales of French programming reached €203.4m (US$224m), down 5.3% compared to 2022’s figures. For context, however, it’s only the third time in 30 years that sales have topped €200m.
The export results were revealed in the annual UniFrance and National Centre for Cinema and the Moving Image (CNC) joint survey during French screenings event Le Rendez-vous in Le Havre this week.
Total exports of French content, including sales, pre-sales, and co-production contributions, were down by 3.3% year-on-year, to €309.2 million.
Scripted drama remains the strongest sector, accounting for 36.6% of total sales across all genres and notching sales of €74.5m, down 7.7% from 2022. The success of the fiction space is attributable to high performing series such as HPI, Marie Antoinette, Bardot and B.R.I., while procedurals such as Deadly Tropics and Astrid: Murder in Paris were also popular internationally.
Factual content recorded total sales of €47.2m, down 3% when compared to 2022’s record performance in this space. The report says that current affairs, science and history docs did particularly well, noting the success of titles like La Grande Traque, Iznik: Les Mystères de la Basilique Engloutie and La Bataille du Cobalt.
There was bleak news, though, for producers working in the beleaguered French animation sector. Sales dropped steeply to €51.2m, down 11.2% from the previous year. The survey suggested that was due to a dramatic drop in sales to the US, which slumped by 69.7% to €4.3m.
The struggles of the animation sector are perhaps unsurprising, after C21 reported in May that many major French studios had scaled back their operations after having projects cancelled by US streamers.
While the survey stressed the negative effects of industry contraction and commissioning rowbacks in the US, sales have rebounded in Western Europe, historically the leading market for French shows.
The region accounted for 46.8% of worldwide revenues, up 6.1 points year-on-year to €95.1m. By contrast, the US accounted for €22.3m, with a market share of 10.9%, though still higher than Asia/Oceania (€14m) and Central and Eastern Europe (€13.1m).
Belgium is the leading buyer of French shows, with sales of €17.1m, with the UK/Ireland second (€12.9m) and Germany/Austria third with (€12.4m). Reinforcing the challenging market conditions across the Atlantic, US buyers spent €9.5m last year, down markedly from the €19.2m recorded in 2022 when it was the leading country for French acquisitions.
Finally, after reaching a record high in 2022, world rights sales slumped 20.1% to a total of €46.3m.
Cécile Lacoue, director of research, CNC, said: “There was a challenging market in 2023,” she said. “There were difficult economic conditions with widespread inflation and many changes among the buyers, downsizing, and the restructuring of major corporations such as Warner Bros. Discovery.”
