Why did Dredd fail at the box office?

There are lots of different reasons why Dredd failed at the box office. To start with there is the fact that the main actors face is never fully seen. The whole film he wears a mask and only his nose and mouth can be seen. This makes it hard for people to identify the main actor at a glance which is often useful for attracting audiences. Masks can be good as they can be used as a symbol to recognise a character such as Iron Man. In the Iron Man films the mask is used but you can still see the actors face which means it advertises better as everyone knows the actor. If Dredd had advertised with the actors face it could have attracted more audience as people will know him and want to watch the film.

The main reason Dredd failed was because it was shown in 3D. The film is mainly aimed at those who don’t go to cinemas to see films in 3D so releasing it almost completely in 3D didn’t appeal to the target audience. Iron man was released in both 2D and 3D so will appeal to a large audience as some people would be more likely to go and see it in 3D for all the special effects and some people will not want to pay so much for 3D and will prefer to see it in 2D. Dredd did not give the audience that option. Many of the people wanting to watch it would want to watch it in 2D as they don’t want to pay the full price of 3D just for the special effects. This meant that most of the people wanting to watch Dredd waited for it to come out on DVD as it came with the option to watch it in 2D or 3D. I think that Dredd could have made much more money if the film had been available in cinemas in 2D as well as 3D so people can chose if they want to pay extra for 3D or not. This would have widened the audience and brought more people to see it at cinemas.

Dredd also failed because The Raid came out at the same time. Both films had a very similar storylines but The Raid did better in the box office due to different audiences etc. When Iron Man was released there where most likely lots of other action adventure films but none with a similar storyline like Dredd and The Raid. Because these two films came out at the same time they were easy to compare so people soon realised The Raid was a better film and therefor attracted more audience to watch it.

Another reason Dredd failed was because it was an 18. This narrowed down the audience and meant that people that could go and see it knew it would be violent due to the age rating which means only people who enjoy watching violent films will want to go and see it. People will instantly stereotype the film because of the rating it has been given and expect violence and gore etc. the film would have done better if it had been diluted down to make it a lower rating as then the audience would be broadened and more people will want to watch it. Iron man is a much lower rating so has a much larger audience and also a bigger fan base due to other Marvel films. Despite the lower rating there are some very violent scenes in the film but it has been diluted down and made a bit funnier to attract a wide range of audience. It can instantly get a bigger audience based on age but also because it has a well-known actor and good storyline.

Dredd is not a well-known story which could be why it didn’t do so well in the box office. If people have heard of the story before e.g. a book or comic they are more likely to want to go and see the film. Iron Man has a huge fan base because of this as it is a well-known comic so there are people who will defiantly want to see it as a film and there are people who have heard of it and want to go and see the film out of interest.

Dredd could also have failed due to the companies involved. These companies are not as big and well known as Marvel (owned by Disney) so films by them are less likely to be instantly thought of as amazing. Films by companies like Marvel are usually very very good so people will hear about a new film and instantly stereotype it to be good because of who it’s made by. Also Dredd was made to compete with American films with similar ratings and violence. These films are likely to be made by huge production companies with much larger budgets. This probably meant they could spend more on special effects. The special effects in Dredd such as the slow motion is good but so much effort has been put into this the other effects such as explosions and fires do not work as well or look so good. I think there was too much focus on the slow motion effects and not enough on the others. In other films such as Iron Man special effect explosions and fires are much more frequent and slow motion is not used that much if at all.

I think overall Dredd mainly failed due to only being released predominantly in 3D, being given an 18 rating and never seeing the actors face. This meant the audience was instantly narrowed to a small few that wanted to go and see it at cinemas and most people who did want to see it waited until it was released on DVD before buying it to watch in 2D. It also meant people had no idea who the actor was and weren’t attracted to watch the film because of this.