Italian cinema arrives on the eve of the 83rd Venice Film Festival (from September 2 to 12) with a surprise, supported by the numbers: the audience is there. And when they find a film capable of becoming an event, they buy the ticket. And at least in 2026, they are doing it much more often.
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Surprise at the box office
As of August 23, the Italian box office has reached 422.9 million, with a 46% jump compared to both 2025 and 2024. Attendance has risen to 55.3 million: 36% more than a year ago. Italian film revenues have also grown, led by Zalone’s Buen Camino: 94.5 million at the box office (+14%), with 900,000 more viewers year over year, reaching 12.9 million.
But it is especially the summer that delivers the real surprise: between June 1 and August 23, revenues rose to 149.5 million: +92% compared to 2025 and +49% over 2024. These numbers seem to dispel, at least for now, the prophecy of a cinema doomed by the rise of streaming. But they do not justify triumphalism. Because the recovery is strong and at the same time unbalanced: it lives on big titles, peaks, recognizable events. Cinema is not dead. but it has become much more selective.
This is demonstrated by the box office rankings. “Odissea” leads in 2026 with 52.1 million, ahead of “Buen Camino” which, however, in the Biglietto d’Oro cycle (from November 1 to October 31) leads with 76.6 million and in 2026 alone has surpassed 40 million. Then “Spiderman” at 34.9 million, “The Devil Wears Prada 2” at 32.2 and Michael at 25.8 million. The picture is therefore more that of a market where the event film continues to move masses of viewers, while the mid-range struggles to keep pace. In the first quarter, seven films were enough to produce half of the revenues.
Italy stuck at 3%
In this context, it is precisely the record summer that exposes what is perhaps the most glaring contradiction of the Italian product. Between June 1 and August 23, while the market rose to 149.5 million in revenues and 19.2 million in attendance, Italian films collected just 4.5 million: 3% of the total, compared to 7% in 2025 and 7.5% in 2024. The most watched national title of the period, “Le Città di Pianura,” stopped at 478,000 euros.
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