‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ shatters box office record with $238 million

Thanks to the massive debut of The Force Awakens the overall box office for all movies this weekend also broke a record, bringing in over $300 million for the first time in history.

The seventh “Star Wars” movie is expected to sell more than $220 million of tickets at us and Canadian theaters through Sunday, beating the record $208.8 million for “Jurassic World” in June, Walt Disney Co said on Saturday.

In a distant second place is Mojin: The Lost Legend which took US$85 million and the top three is rounded out by Surprise – Journey To The West with US$24 million.

Rounding out the eight most-popular movies this weekend, in the US 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). Worldwide the film has pulled in $517 million total, putting it just shy of Jurassic World’s $524 million. Force Awakens shattered records in a number of key territories, including the United Kingdom, where it earned almost $50 million in its first four days.

“When you cue up all the footage and things that were shown, it’s really not a lot of the film, and I think that’s what makes it incredibly special”.

“The Force Awakens”, which has had its legions of fans frothing at the mouth ever since its mooted release, has grossed an estimated 129.5 million internationally since it opened overseas on Wednesday, setting records in Britain, Germany, Norway and Sweden. About $99 million of Jurassic World’s record came from China, and The Force Awakens won’t open in China until January 9. The film cost $30 million to produce. Star Wars: Episode III’s release there in 2005 only took in $9 million.

The newest film in the George Lucas-created franchise – directed by J.J.

The latest film, which some analysts expect to gross more than $2 billion, stars Daisy Ridley, John Boyega and Oscar Isaac.

“It was bigger than a movie”, Dave Hollis, Disney’s distribution chief, said.