Film revenue fell in 2005 mainly due to few hit foreign movies, according to the Motion Pictures Producers Association of Japan.
Revenue fell 6 percent to 198.16 billion yen last year from a record 210.90 billion yen in 2004, slipping below the 200 billion yen line for the first time in three years, the association said. The number of moviegoers dropped 5.7 percent to 160.45 million.
Revenue from foreign movies tumbled 11.7 percent to 116.38 billion yen. "Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" was the only film whose ticket sales surpassed 10 billion yen, association Chairman Isao Matsuoka told reporters Tuesday.
Ticket sales for Japanese films rose 3.4 percent to 81.8 billion yen , or 41.3 percent of overall box-office revenue, exceeding 40 percent for the first time in eight years.
The top grossing domestic film was Hayao Miyazaki's "Howl no Ugoku Shiro" ("Howl's Moving Castle"), which yielded 19.6 billion yen, followed by "Pocket Monster Advanced Generation" with 4.3 billion yen and "Koshonin Mashita Masayoshi" ("Negotiator") with 4.2 billion yen.
Among the foreign flicks, Harry Potter brought in 11.5 billion yen, followed by "Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of Sith" at 9.17 billion yen and "War of the Worlds" at 6 billion yen.
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