The massive popularity of Harry Potter helped Warner Bros retain its spot as the biggest-grossing UK movie studio for the second consecutive year.

Warner Bros's record box office revenues of £205.8 million was £22m ahead of the nearest rival Paramount, which earned £183.8m.

Universal Pictures came in third with £137.3m, followed by Twentieth Century Fox (£132.2m) and Disney (£100.8m).

Warner Bros was primarily boosted by the box office performance of the final Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2, but also The Hangover Part II and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

The studio was also named the number one home video distributor for the second year running.

After its premiere at London's Trafalgar Square was attended by 35,000 fans in July, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 went on to generate £73.1m for Warner Bros at the UK box office.

The final film based on JK Rowling's books attracted the two biggest single days in UK box office history, racking up £9.48m on the Friday and £7.62m on the Saturday of its opening week, followed by the biggest ever Sunday takings, at £6.64m. The film also had the biggest 3D weekend gross of all time in the UK and Ireland.

In Warner's 2011 slate, the film was followed by The Hangover Part II (£32.8m), Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (£18.5m - still on general release), Horrible Bosses (£10.5m), Yogi Bear (£9m), Contagion (£5.5m) and Midnight in Paris (£2.6m).

Rupert Grint, Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson at the 'Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows Part 2' New York Premiere
The company's gross UK income at the box office was up 2% year-on-year, and it held an 18.04% share of the theatrical distribution market in Britain.

"Being crowned the UK's number one film distributor with record box office grosses for a second consecutive year is an absolutely stunning achievement when you consider the heavyweight competition we faced and the continuing challenging economic climate we're all operating in," said Warner Bros UK and Ireland president & managing director Josh Berger.

"Our success is reflective of the continuing leadership Warner Bros enjoys here in the UK. From films to home entertainment, TV shows to video games and licensed products, the company is leading the way thanks to the remarkable content it produces year in year out, and the talented teams and industry colleagues who bring these brilliant products to market."

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 and Part 2 also helped Warner Bros retain its spot as the top distributor of home video, with a UK value market share of 15.5%.

Other strong performing titles included The Hangover Part II, Green Lantern and Due Date; along with TV franchises such as True Blood, The Big Bang Theory and The Vampire Diaries.

"While 2011 will forever be remembered for the home entertainment release of not one but two Harry Potter movies, which have collectively sold 5.5 million units to date, it was also a year that saw us enjoy incredible success right across our portfolio," said John Stanley, the managing director of Warner Home Entertainment Group UK & Ireland.

"The combined results are indicative of the support we've received from our retail partners and the passion and dedication of our market-leading team, which delivered so much last year."

Warner Bros expects to have a strong 2012 with a release slate that includes Christopher Nolan's hotly-anticipated The Dark Knight Rises and Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Other forthcoming movies from the studio include Wrath of the Titans, Dark Shadows, Gravity and Jack the Giant Killer.


Elsewhere this year, the Warner Bros Studio Tour London - The Making of Harry Potter will open at the end of March, and the new £100m state-of the-art Warner Bros Studios at Leavesden will launch in the summer.

Berger said: "With the opening of Warner Bros Studios Leavesden and a burgeoning UK film, TV and games production slate, 2012 represents a watershed moment for the company.

Fox opened The Iron Lady, the biopic of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher starring Meryl Streep, in the No. 3 spot in the U.K. Debut for the Pathe/Film 4/Canal Plus coproduction came up with a weekend tally of an estimated $3 million from some 445 locations.

The Iron Lady storms to No. 1 at UK box office

Cinemas were packed out this weekend as the public flocked to see Meryl Streep as The Iron Lady.

Polarising Thatcher biopic stands up well in multiplexes against M:I 4 and Sherlock, but The Artist beats her at the arthouse

The winnerDespite the enormous amount of publicity attracted by Margaret Thatcher biopic The Iron Lady, it was always hard to predict how the flick would perform at the box office.

Those who loathed her while she was in power would surely prove highly resistant.

But her supporters might consider the film's depiction of her dementia to be an affront to her dignity.

For those reasons, even the most optimistic predictions for debut weekend would surely have fallen well short of £2m.

The Iron Lady's actual opening salvo of £2.15m is a happy outcome for distribution partners Pathe and Fox, as is the screen average of £4,901.

Top site is Odeon West End (£49,332), top arthouse is Curzon Mayfair (£29,706), and top venue outside London, counter-intuitively, is Cineworld Glasgow Renfrew Street (£17,978).

The skew towards to London and the south-east mirrors the result achieved by The King's Speech with 16.33% of revenue earned in the generously defined "West End" area (includes Peckham, Brixton and Swiss Cottage), and a further 25.41% in the "London" region (which takes in many towns outside the M25, including Luton, Reading, Guildford and Chelmsford).

National averages for flicks released in 2011 are 7.96% and 18.63% respectively.

Figures for The King's Speech's opening weekend were 16.16% West End and 25.25% in outer London.

One surprise is a relatively strong showing in Ireland.

Not only is Cineworld Dublin The Iron Lady's second-best non-London site, but the flick garnered 6.29% of its total gross in the Republic, as against 3.75% for The King's Speech on opening weekend.

Figures for Northern Ireland – scene of the IRA hunger strikes that saw 10 deaths in 1981 – are 1.70% of takings for The Iron Lady versus only 0.97% for The King's Speech.

The distributor partners concede that The Iron Lady did play wider in both areas, which will have been a factor, adding that Meryl Streep is a big positive in Ireland, where her flicks traditionally outperform the market.

Another surprise is that The Iron Lady took a slightly bigger share of its earnings in Yorkshire (5.03%), scene of the miners' strike, than The King's Speech did (4.72%), but that's more down to success in upmarket York and Harrogate than, say, Bradford and Doncaster.

Despite proving the market's biggest grosser on Sunday, The Iron Lady was deprived of the weekend top spot by neck-and-neck holdover titles Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (£2.22m) and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows (£2.16m).

Both experienced slim declines from the previous weekend of 18% and 15% respectively.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo rose an encouraging 5%, with takings of £1.65m.

The plucky contenderWhile The Iron Lady slugged it out with M:I 4 and Sherlock 2 in the plexes, in the arthouses it faced tough competition from hot awards contender The Artist, expanding from a single-site platform to 106 cinemas on its second weekend.

With a hefty haul of £629,000, the black-and-white crowdpleaser earned the best screen average in the market, £5,939.

Top site was Curzon Soho (£22,475), followed by Curzon Chelsea, Ritzy Brixton, the Barbican and Everyman Hampstead.

Outside London, top site was Duke of York's Brighton.

The Artist is following a very similar pattern to Brokeback Mountain, which opened on the exact same date (30 December) six years ago, with a one-week showcase at the exact same cinema (Vue West End), before expanding to a slightly wider 125 sites on 6 January.

Brokeback achieved a higher gross in its first week than The Artist did – £109,492 versus £91,554 – and the pattern has been repeated with the expansion.

Brokeback stood at £987,000 at the end of its second weekend, as against £721,000 for The Artist.

It's worth remembering that Ang Lee's flick benefited from stronger marketable elements, including the source material (by Annie Proulx), stars (Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal) and story hook (gay cowboys).

It would be wrong to characterise The Artist's UK numbers so far as in any way disappointing.

The alternativeFor audiences not tempted by prestige Oscar contenders, gleefully bloody ice hockey comedy Goon offered a nice alternative.

Cannily positioned by distributor eOne as a cheeky piece of counter-programming, the modestly budgeted picture grossed a handy £728,000, powered by the appeal of Seann William Scott, who scored on this date three years ago with Role Models, and actor Jay Baruchel, who also co-wrote Goon with Evan Goldberg (Superbad).

The futureDespite the success of The Iron Lady and the holdover titles, the market offered no match for the equivalent weekend a year ago, when new entrants The King's Speech and 127 Hours delivered a hefty double punch.

Overall takings are 14% down from a year ago.

Cinema owners will be hoping for strong holds from The Iron Lady and an expanding The Artist, plus fresh blood from Steven SpielbergUK b's potentially crowdpleasing War Horse.

Steve McQueen's Shame, starring Michael Fassbender, joins the battle for upscale audiences, while action sci-fi The Darkest Hour, from producer Timur Bekmambetov (Night Watch, Day Watch), should suck up genre fans.

Top 10 films

1.Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol, £2,223,200 from 517 sites.

Total: £13,063,492

2.Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, £2,163,718 from 518 sites, Total: £20,728,530

3.The Iron Lady, £2,151,368 from 439 sites (New)

4.The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, £1,649,100 from 473 sites.

Total: £7,859,144

5.Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked, £922,103 from 504 sites.

Total: £11,650,796

6.Puss in Boots, £917,161 from 501 sites.

Total: £12,153,259

7.Goon, £728,286 from 358 sites (New)

8.The Artist, £629,495 from 106 sites.

Total: £721,049

9.New Year's Eve, £339,685 from 320 sites.

Total: £7,057,716

10.Hugo, £161,794 from 190 sites.

Total: £4,979,342

Other openers

Players, 49 sites, £109,512

Uchithanai Muharnthaal, four sites, £7,254

Mother and Child, 12 sites, £4,816

Despair, one site, £2,007

1 Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol USA \£2,223,200 Paramount -73 2 517 \£4,300 \£13,063,492
2 Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows UK/USA \£2,163,718 Warner Bros -15 4 518 \£4,177 \£20,728,530
3 The Iron Lady UK \£2,151,368 20th Century Fox - 1 439 \£4,901 \£2,151,368
4 The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo USA/Swe \£1,649,100 Sony Pictures -62 2 473 \£3,486 \£7,859,144
5 Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked USA \£922,103 20th Century Fox -36 4 504 \£1,830 \£11,650,796
6 Puss in Boots USA \£917,161 Paramount -33 5 501 \£1,831 \£12,153,259
7 Goon USA/Can \£728,286 eOne Films - 1 358 \£2,034 \£728,286
8 The Artist Fra/Bel \£629,495 Entertainment 1199 2 106 \£5,939 \£721,049
9 New Year's Eve USA \£339,685 Warner Bros -54 5 320 \£1,062 \£7,057,716
10 Hugo UK/USA/Fra \£161,794 Entertainment -34 6 190 \£852 \£4,979,342
11 Happy Feet 2 Aus \£138,984 Warner Bros -37 6 332 \£419 \£5,235,104
12 Players Ind \£109,512 B4U - 1 49 \£2,235 \£109,512
13 The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 1 USA \£96,374 eOne Films -29 8 126 \£765 \£30,636,792
14 Arthur Christmas UK/USA \£60,860 Sony Pictures -80 9 341 \£178 \£20,764,510
15 Don 2 Ind \£57,418 Reliance -69 3 48 \£1,196 \£1,377,339
Total \£12,349,058 4822 \£2,561 \£139,216,239

Other UK films
17 My Week with Marilyn UK/USA \£31,681 Entertainment 31 7 37 \£856 \£2,966,485
18 The Lady Fra/UK \£25,557 Entertainment -72 2 64 \£399 \£200,519
19 Dreams of a Life UK/Ire \£18,101 Dogwoof 44 4 15 \£1,207 \£120,445
22 We Need to Talk About Kevin UK/USA \£8,738 Paramount 146 12 5 \£1,748 \£2,181,983
24 Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy UK \£7,048 Studio Canal -39 17 5 \£1,410 \£14,133,500
32 Wuthering Heights UK \£4,816 Artificial Eye 134 9 8 \£602 \£577,349
40 The Awakening UK \£2,843 Studio Canal 1028 9 5 \£569 \£660,735
41 Johnny English Reborn UK \£2,659 Universal -92 14 12 \£222 \£20,613,465
43 The Deep Blue Sea UK \£2,412 Artificial Eye -50 7 6 \£402 \£472,794
48 Weekend UK \£1,910 Peccadillo 6 10 2 \£955 \£212,260
59 Desi Boyz UK \£727 Eros -63 7 1 \£727 \£593,092


Other openers
31 Mother and Child USA/Spa \£4,816 Verve - 1 12 \£401 \£4,816

Comments on this week's top 15 results
Against last weekend: -38%

Against last year: -14%

Rolling 52 week ranking: 24th

UK* films in top 15: 4

UK* share of top 15 gross: 36.7%

* Includes domestic productions and co-productions

Excluding previews the weekend gross for Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol has decreased by 18%.
Excluding previews the weekend gross for The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo has increased by 5%.


Openers next week - 13 January 2012
War Horse UK/USA Disney
Shame UK/Aus/USA Momentum/Alliance
The Darkest Hour USA 20th Century Fox
Kurtulus Son Durak Tur Kinostar
Margin Call USA Stealth
Nanban Ind B4U
Podaa Podi UK Ayngaran
Tatsumi Singapore Soda

U.K. Box Office Takings in 2011 Break the Billion Pound Barrier for First Time
Top three movies “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2,” “The King’s Speech” and “The Inbetweeners” bring in the bucks; inward investment goes past the billion pound mark.

LONDON – Box office takings broke the billion pound barrier in the U.K. in 2012 for the first time ever, total U.K. spend on movie-making rose year-on-year while The King’s Speech and The Inbetweeners fueled the indie British movie scene appetite, according to the latest British Film Institute research.

The BFI Research and Statistics Unit facts and figures indicate that for the first time ever, more than £1 billion ($1.56 billion) was coralled from cinemagoers -- excluding takings in the Republic of Ireland normally included in the totals -- on the back of box office wizardry for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2, regal takings for The King’s Speech and bawdy laughs for The Inbetweeners.

Potter was number one with £73 million ($114.6 million), Speech took £45.6 million ($71.6 million) and Inbetweeners grabbed £45 million ($70.6 million).

The U.K. box office total nosed over with £1.04 billion ($1.63 billion), a rise of 5 percent on 2010 with total admissions tallying up to 171.6 million in 2011, up 1.4 percent on the previous year.

The record-breaking grosses must be digested in the context of a hike in the tax on cinema tickets which rose from 17.5 percent to 20 percent in January 2011.

The stats show that the market share of U.K. box office for British independent films rose 13.5 percent - the highest ever recorded, reaching 36.2 percent when including both independents and those shot in the U.K. but financed from abroad. The market share in 2010 for the equivalent movies stood at 24 percent.

According to the BFI, the strong performance was driven by the popularity of both British independents and blockbusters made in the U.K. with British talent, crew and services, such as Harry Potter and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows.

2011 also proved a good year for inward investment – cash coming in from overseas, largely accounted for by studio-backed projects – with £1 billion ($1.56 billion), up from £979.7 million ( $1.54 billion) in 2010.

Movies adding to the overseas investment included Marc Forster’s geo-political thrillerWorld War Z starring Brad Pitt, Ridley Scott’s sci-fi adventure Prometheus starring Michael Fassbender, Noomi Rapace and Charlize Theron and Cloud Atlas, the international ensemble drama starring Tom Hanks.

British Film Commission chief executive Adrian Wootton, the man tasked with keeping the cash coming to British shores, said the figures are a welcome fillip in harsh economic times.

“2011’s production figures are further evidence that the UK is home to some of the world’s most talented and sought-after film-making talent. Coupled with our excellent infrastructure and facilities, the U.K. film industry is continuing to have a positive impact on the economy, which at the moment is something which should be celebrated and of which we should be proud,” Wootton said.

Total investment in movie production reached £1.26 billion ($1.98 billion) in 2011, a fresh record for the British film industry and a small rise from 2010’s £1.25 billion (£1.96 billion).

But while spend on film production in the U.K. overall was up in 2011, the total number of U.K. films produced with budgets of £500,000 ($784,720) and more fell to 71, down from 78 in 2010. 98 films were made on budgets of less than $784,720, bringing the total number of local U.K. feature films produced in 2011 to 169, again down on 2010’s 262 films.

The expenditure on making U.K. local movies in 2011 also fell to £194 million ($304 million), 9.4 percent down on 2010’s £214 million ($336 million) total.

While fewer U.K. films were made, the number of British co-productions with other countries, the majority with other EU member states, rose to 40 in 2011from 30 in 2010.

Co-productions recorded a U.K. spend of £59 million ($92.6 million), up from £56.3 million ($88.3 million) in 2010.

“Film is at the very core of Britain’s cultural life and today’s figures show that the appetite for cinema-going across the U.K. is as healthy as ever. 2011 was a phenomenal year, with the box office results showing that independently produced British films captivated audiences,” said BFI CEO Amanda Nevill before hitting a cautionary note. “That said, we are pragmatic; it’s still a challenging time for filmmakers trying to raise finance to make independent British films in this tough economic climate.”

The new Hammer Horror A Woman In Black, a spooky new ghost story starring Daniel Radcliffe, has shattered UK box office expectations during its three day opening weekend (Fri-Sun), grossing an estimated £3.1million.

It is the highest opening ever for a Hammer film in the UK and the biggest British Independent opening of 2012 for Momenutm Pictures.

Walt Disney’s long awaited return of The Muppets had to settle for second place but still took a decent $4.1m (£2.6m) from its 537 locations. The half term should see it post strong numbers throughout the week, especially with a lack of direct family competition opening this week.

The 3D re-release of Fox’s Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace showed the force is still strong in the UK, after grossing $2.3m (£1.5m) from its 380 locations.