“Star Wars'” worldwide take is projected at $517 million, the second-highest opening weekend of all time, behind “Jurassic World’s” $525 million.
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One big reason? Star Wars hasn’t opened in China yet, where Jurassic World made US$99 million (S$140 million) during its opening weekend.
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The seventh movie in the beloved space saga was expected to sell more than US$220 million of tickets in American and Canadian theatres by yesterday, beating the record US$208.8 million for Jurassic World in June, Walt Disney Co said last Saturday.
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With Thursday night previews, the film grossed $57 million in the domestic market, another record that also beats Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2’s record of $43.5 million.
While “Star Wars” helped create the summer blockbuster, “The Force Awakens” is debuting in the holiday season of December, where the previous top opening was the $84.6 million debut of 2012’s “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”.
It was also the first movie to cross 100 million US dollars within 24 hours after screened in theaters. “It’s just a ideal storm of Star Wars enthusiasm”.
The film’s success isn’t too surprising, given the fact that it had already broken pre-sale ticket records.
According to social analysis by Amobee, on the films release there were almost 1.3 million tweets mentioning Star Wars with Twitter sentiment being 25 per cent Positive, 63 per cent Neutral, and 12 per cent Negative.
The film began its worldwide rollout on Wednesday and has grossed an additional $130 million internationally so far, bringing its global cumulative box office to $250 million.
Image from “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” trailer. “Avatar” holds that title with $2.8 billion in global sales. However, “The Force Awakens” total does not include sales in China, where the movie won’t open until January 9.
Audience polling firm CinemaScore gave the new release an A grade, including an A-plus among women and younger audiences.
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In the Asia-Pacific, the movie raked in $75.7 million, whereas in Latin America, it totted $36.0 million.
