The film debuts to American audiences on Thursday night.
Story by Matt Cummings
December is usually a slow time for films, even as Hollywood dons its brightest stars in a bevy of Oscars candidates. But all of them could be wiped out by Star Wars: The Force Awakens, as The Hollywood Reporter announced that advance ticket sales had reached $100m in North America. This number is the highest for any upcoming film, beating out sales for Age of Ultron and Jurassic World. The $100m figure includes the $50-60m in sales for the opening weekend, which as you may remember shut down servers, forcing audiences to visit theaters directly to purchase their tickets.
Disney has continued to decline comment on the real numbers, but emails from vendors such as Cinemark have already announced that they expanding the amount of screenings. According to THR, theaters owners agreed to take the movie if they promised to play it for four to five weeks. This isn't an uncommon practice, but some audiences were worried that the ultimatum could have meant that Disney was worried about the quality of the film. That seemed to disappear on Monday night, after the red carpet premiere in which dozens of celebrities praised the end result.
The previous record holder for advance tickets was The Dark Knight Rises in 2012, with $25m. Sources close to THR also report that Awakens could top $120m before Thursday's official release date. Fandango also reported top sales, doubling Age of Ultron and Jurassic World by 20%. Tracking services like Rentrak are estimated a combined domestic opening for Awakens of $180-220m, which could be on the high side. Again, December sees distracted shoppers and families traveling for the holidays, but it's clear that the week between Christmas and New Years could see incredible sales as students and other employees take off extended time from work.
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