UK-born characters top the box office
Thursday, 05 Oct 2006 07:39
Harry Potter works magic in the worldwide box office chart
Films based on characters dreamt up by British writers raked in £6.7 billion at box offices across the world between 2001 and 2005, according to new figures.
The Lord of the Rings trilogy, based on novels penned by JRR Tolkien, and the four Harry Potter films, taken from JK Rowling's popular stories, dominate the top 20 world movie chart revealed by the UK Film Council.
Between them the films occupy the top seven places in the chart, with Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King seizing the top spot, closely followed by the first Harry Potter instalment, The Philosopher's Stone, in second place.
According to the UK Film Council, from 2001 to 2005, six of the top ten films at the worldwide box office and 19 of the top 100 were based on stories and characters created by British writers.
Alongside the Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter films, the top ten box office hits included the Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, based on CS Lewis' magical tale, The War of the Worlds, based on HG Wells' iconic novel and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, based on a children's story authored by Roald Dahl.
Meanwhile, Ian Flemming's notorious spy James Bond made the top 20 with the film Die Another Day, as did Helen Fielding's chaotic singleton Bridget Jones, with the two movies based on the character both appearing in the chart, alongside Love Actually, written by British screenwriter Richard Curtis.
This year, the most popular British film amongst UK cinema audiences to date was named as The Da Vinci Code. The movie qualifies as a British movie due to the proportion of the film that was shot in the UK, the amount of British talent who worked on its production and the percentage of its budget that was spent here.
The UK Film Council also reported that Britain is becoming an increasingly popular production venue for movie makers, with the amount of money spent on film production in the UK rising by 76 per cent during the first half of 2006, compared to last year.