“Star Wars: The Force Awakens”, the seventh instalment in the cinematic space saga, smashed box-office records on its opening day and is looking to have the most successful opening weekend in Hollywood history.
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It crushed the previous record – $43.5 million – set in 2011 by the same “Harry Potter” film. The early figures suggest “The Force Awakens” is on course to exceed the record domestic opening of “Jurassic World”, which debuted with $208.8 million.
J. J Abrams is winning acclaim for the hugely successful Star Wars: The Force Awakens but he’s now revealed that he had a lot of doubts about taking on the franchise. Hollis said exhibitors are continually adding more screenings to satisfy demand.
It took five days for the dinosaur adventure to bring in the same amount of money as The Force Awakens is expected to make this weekend.
“This represents a new record for the industry and portends a massive and potentially record-breaking opening day and weekend for the film”, said Paul Dergarabedian, of box office tracker Rentrak.
The latest Star Wars film may very well be the most anticipated film in the galaxy, and yet, for Disney, the stakes remain high.
The legendary actress offered some of her life wisdom to her “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” co-star, telling her it wouldn’t be wise to “go through the crew like wildfire”.
The film, which carries a production cost of at least $200 million, opened in 32 additional foreign markets Thursday will open in most other markets Friday.
As far as all-time box office sales, two films by James Cameron hold the record – “Avatar” ($2.78 billion) and “Titanic” ($2.18 billion).
Joe Renken was the first in line to see the “Force Awakens” in RPX at Regal Stadium.
“Sisters” will likely pull in $13 million from 2,961 North American theaters this weekend as Universal offers counterprogramming for comedy fans.
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Disney Interactive and Lucasfilm today launched Star Wars:™ The Force Awakens™ Play Set, the third Star Wars™ Play Set for Disney Infinity 3.0 Edition, this year’s No. 1 “toys-to-life” video game.
