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Mark Cosgrove’s Blog – 8th March

Posted on 8 Mar 2019

Each week, Watershed Cinema Curator Mark Cosgrove shares insights into Watershed’s cinema programme, how well films are performing compared with the National average and expectations for up-coming titles.

The big hit of the first weekend in March was Marielle Heller’s Can You Ever Forgive Me? which I finally managed to get space for in the film’s 5th week of release. We had been getting regular requests to screen it but simply had no space until this weekend. It attracted very healthy admissions.

Next highest was the second weekend of Capernaum, which has been attracting fantastic audience responses. There was much anticipation for Irish debut horror Hole in The Ground but it struggled to make an impact – I do think horror (and indeed traditional genre films) struggle to play outside the mainstream and if they are in the mainstream, they need serious marketing spend to raise awareness.

Other new opener Sauvage performed very well. I had hedged my bets on this one as it is a tough subject matter but it out performed Foxtrot and Hannah, also opening this weekend, and Sauvage could have played for a full week. If there is space I’ll get it back for some more screenings. Despite good reviews for those films (Foxtrot/Hannah) they have not made much impact on box-office.

Film Hub South West

Mark Cosgrove’s Blog – 8th March

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