Box Office Figures

Box Office figures are falling, why do you think this is and do you think this trend will continue?

Yes Box office figures are falling and this is caused by many factors. Cinematic experiences can be replicated elsewhere, and this means that instead of paying a high rate of money for the cinema, audiences can easily watch the film at home on a TV, mobile phone and Laptops/computers. This also links to the wide range of alternatives instead of the cinema, audiences can easily access video games and Netflix at home and have the certainty of a positive experience. A huge issue is that the experience is too costly, this is shown through the changes of prices over the last 16 years. In 1999, the price for a cinema ticket was £3 and in 2015 it was £11. This drastic increase means that many cant afford to pay for the cinema tickets, which leads the audience to watch the film illegally.

In 2014 the US Box office revenue hit its lowest point since 1995. Roughly 1.26 billion consumers purchased cinema tickets in 2014, this is the lowest since 1995. The highest being 1.5 billion in 2002 with SpiderMan being the number 1 worldwide. These figures represent a 6% drop in ticket sales from 2013. Despite 2014 containing many box office 'hits', the year also saw a wide range of failures or films deemed to have fallen short of their high expectations. One of these films was the Winters Tale directed by Akiva Goldsman. The budget was $60 million however, they only managed to receive $30 million from the box office losing 50% of income. This contrasted highly with the global box office in 2015. The global box office hit an all time high of $38.5 billion.

Though box office figures are falling, many people excluding myself believe that 2015 was a one time occurrence. The Box office for 2015 was huge and this occurred because of many factors. The main factor is the big Franchises released that year, such as Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Jurassic World. These both racked up more than $1 billion each. This meant that this, combined with Avenger: age of ultron, minions and Fast and Furious, the 2015 box office had already more than $5 billion. Another factor is the international audiences. The franchises and films in 2015 appealed to international audiences by including multi cultural casts. This meant that big film stars from around the world attract their fans to that film. This also meant that the female audience was increased because there is a greater gender equality, such as the main character in Star Wars: The force Awakens is called Ray. She is portrayed by Daisy Ridley. This strong female actor appealed to a wide range of international audience.
North Americas box office accounted for 35% of overall ticket sales, this meant that just for one part of the world, a huge amount was accounted for in the Global Box office.