Nollywood films are doing better at the box office but still losing to foreign movies.

Despite spending over N500 million in July, only a small portion went to Nigerian movies.

Business Insider Sub-Saharan Africa breaks it down, takes a look at the highest-earning foreign and local movies.

The cinema culture in Nigeria continues to thrive with moviegoers spending N636 million in July. This is a 58 percent increase from the N402.9 million spent in theatres across the country in June.

Despite this spike, Nollywood releases in July accounted for a minuscule portion of ticket sales.

Most of the earnings went to foreign blockbusters like ‘Spider-Man: Far From Home’ and the newly released ‘Lion King’ while less than N20 million to Nollywood.

The breakdown

The month started off on a great note from a box office perspective for indigenous films with ‘The Bling Lagosians’ topping the charts from June 28 — July 4, 2019.

During this period, the film, which has been dubbed ‘the best Nollywood movie of 2019,’ made N37 million. The top 20 films grossed a total of N100.7m during those seven days.

Top 20 films (ceanigeria)

ALSO READ: ‘The Bling Lagosians’ is a much better film than you think it is

This changed with the release of ‘Spider-Man: Far From Home’ on July 5, 2019. The Disney/Marvel superhero film pushed the Nollywood film to second place, with total earnings of N125.9 million over seven days.

Top 20 films (ceanigeria)

The directorial debut of Bolanle Austen-Peters managed to hold on to its second position, making an additional N18.88 million while moviegoers spent a total of N105.6 million from July 12th–18th.

Top 20 films (ceanigeria)

By the fourth week, it had moved to third place and earned another N13 million. This was due to the release of Disney’s remake of the classic ‘Lion King’ which led to a spike in cinema revenue (N167.1 million), the highest of the entire month.

Top 20 films (ceanigeria)

By the end of the month (July 26 — August 1, 2019), The Bling Lagosians was in fourth place and the only Nigerian movie on the top five list. It earned a total of N107.8 million while the top 20 films brought in N136.9 million.

Top 20 films (ceanigeria)

Overall, moviegoers spent a total of N636 million throughout the entire month of July.

Other high earning Nollywood films in July were:

'Mokalik' - N5.5 million

'Rant Queens' - N3.98 million

Simi and Toni Afolayan on the set of 'Mokalik'

'Executioner' - N1.5 million

'The Gift' - N1.4 million