End to 2013 Breaks All-Time Aussie Box Office Record

Pictured: the AU Box Office in human form.

Last year ended with a record breaking finale, with the week commencing on Boxing Day becoming the highest grossing week of all time at the Australian box office. The $49,897,786 was supported by a diverse slate of new releases: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, Frozen, The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty, Philomena and Australian independent film The Railway Man – as well as strong holdover business from films playing into that week including Anchorman 2, Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs 2 and American Hustle. The previous record was the week-ending 7 July 2010 where the release of The Twilight Saga: Eclipse and Toy Story 3 took the box office to $46,955,856.

From an annual perspective, the Australian Box Office results for 2013 have revealed that cinema-going is still one of the most popular forms of entertainment in this country and, despite economic flux and in the face of ever increasing leisure options, remains resilient. 2013 Box Office takings finished at $ $1,099,615,801, a slight drop of 2.3% from 2012, with Iron Man 3 leading the way as the #1 movie of the year, grossing over $ 39 million.

The Top 10 films of 2013 (see below) represented a significant 27% of the total annual Box Office, consisting of a strong mix of franchises, such as Fast and Furious 6, Man of Steel, the first installment of The Hobbit, and The Hunger Games sequel, as well as the broadly appealing animation hits Despicable Me 2, Monsters University and The Croods with Life of Pi, and Australian-made The Great Gatsby rounding out the biggest movies of the year.

The total cume of $27,383,762 for Baz Luhrman’s The Great Gatsby positions it as the 6th most popular Australian film off all-time at the local Box Office.