Clean sweep for remakes and sequels in top 10 films of 2019

The biggest films at the UK box office last year were all franchises or remakes, new figures show, with not a stand-alone movie to be seen.

Avengers: Endgame was the number one film of 2019, taking a massive £88.7 million in cinemas.

In second place was The Lion King (£76.0 million) followed by Toy Story 4 (£66.2 million) and Joker (£58.0 million).

The latest Star Wars film, The Rise Of Skywalker, failed to perform as well as previous instalments of the sci-fi series, taking £54.9 million, enough to put it in fifth place.

Every film in the top 10 was either a sequel, part of a franchise, or a reworking of an existing movie.

In sixth place was Frozen 2, followed by Captain Marvel, Aladdin, Spider-Man: Far From Home and Jumanji: The Next Level.

Seven of the top 10 were distributed by Disney, including chart-topper Avengers: Endgame.

The figures, which include the box office for Ireland as well as the UK, were compiled by the British Film Institute.

They show that the biggest stand-alone film was Rocketman, which finished just outside the top 10 at number 13 and took £23.4 million.

Downton Abbey was the highest grossing independent UK film of 2019, with takings of £28.2 million.

Overall UK cinema admissions in 2019 were 176 million, the second highest level since 1970 and down slightly (0.6%) on 2018.