Finnish “Oscars” aka Jussi prize has nominated five films in the category of the best film in 2016. The other nominations include the Cannes winner Happiest Day in the life of Olli Mäki and the Oscar nominated director Selma Vilhunen‘s first feature Little Wings.
The Angry Birds Movie had 336 373 viewers in Finland during 2016 and was left behind only by another children’s hit movie Ricky Rapper and the Nighthawk. However, in the box office in Finland The Angry Birds was number one and did very well worldwide too.
“Globally the film has reached about 60 million viewers,” estimates Jussi Mäkelä from Walt Disney Company Nordic, the distributor of the film in Finland.
After the film’s release it went straight to no. 1 in 52 countries. And the total global box office reached almost 350M USD leaving any Finnish film ever made far behind. On the contrary, Finnish animated features have done very good, leaving most live action features targeting international audiences behind. Animation travels well even it comes from the country formerly having very little animation industry. The growth started in 2000 with advantages of high level talent and efficiency in computer animation pipeline proved already by many cases.
In the category of movies based on the video game worldwide, The Angry Birds Movie comes all time second place, only after the Lara Croft: Tomb Rider movie (2001). The movie bases on the world’s probably most successful mobile game by the Finnish company Rovio Entertainment Ltd, that has currently animation studio facilities both in Espoo, Finland, and Vancouver, Canada, and game studios in London, Stockholm and Espoo, employing more than 400 professionals of all backgrounds and nationalities.
Read more news on Rovio website.