Among records shattered by the film were single-day sales, which had never before topped $100 million.
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“Star Wars'” worldwide take is projected at $517 million, the second-highest opening weekend of all time, behind “Jurassic World’s” $525 million.
“Star Wars: Episode VII” brought in an estimated $238 million. By weekend’s end, The Force Awakens could soar past $245 million to lock down the biggest opening weekend ever, toppling the previous champ, Jurassic World’s $208 million opening, The Hollywood Reporter writes.
After its record-breaking performance on Thursday and Friday night, Disney’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens continues to smash records.
The movie has opened in all markets except Greece and India, where it starts playing on Christmas Eve, and China, which has set a Jan 9 debut.
Yesterday’s £8.6 million ($12.8 million) takings were the biggest Saturday figure of all time in the United Kingdom and Ireland, beating the two current leading three-day openers, “Skyfall” and “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2” at this stage in release. The U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Australia were among the territories reporting record Imax grosses for the film. Star Wars has smashed that to bits, with a take of $238m in just one weekend. But it’s only opening weekend.
Rounding out the eight most-popular movies this weekend, in the USA and Canada and as estimated by the studios and Rentrak, were “Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 2” ($5.7 million), “Creed” ($5 million), “The Good Dinosaur” ($4.2 million), “Krampus” ($3.8 million) and “In The Heart Of The Sea” ($3.5 million).
The new Star Wars film is the first instalment in a decade of the series, which was created by George Lucas in 1977.
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In 2015, four films have passed the $1 billion global mark: Minions ($1.157 billion), Avengers: Age of Ultron ($1.4 billion), Furious 7 ($1.514 billion), and Jurassic World.
