Star Wars: The Force Awakens box office collections reach massive $250 mn

Star Wars: The Force Awakens collected a galactic $250-million (R3.7-billion) in global ticket sales on Friday and headed towards a historic opening weekend in the USA and Canada as fans around the world revelled in the return of the beloved space saga.

Force Awakens’ performance sets a new standard for how much the North American box office can expand with the right movie, and puts pressure on Hollywood studios to make events out of their Big Pictures. The movie reportedly raked in more than $100 million in pre-sales before its early Thursday night opening, and when the final theatrical trailer was played during Monday night football on ESPN, it was subsequently viewed more than 128 million times over a 24-hour period.

The Force Awakens has a shot at becoming the highest-grossing movie of all time, according to some analysts. However, the latter had the advantage of opening in China as well; The Force Awakens doesn’t come out there until 9 January, 2016.

Meanwhile “Creed”, a next-generation version of the “Rocky” series earned some $5.1 million to land in fifth, in its fourth week on the big screen.

According to Variety, J.J. Abrams’ “Episode VII” has already smashed a pair of opening box office records, and is well on its way to more. The previous record holder for a December opening was “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”, which took in $85 million in 2012.

The JJ Abrams-directed seventh instalment in the franchise George Lucas created and launched in 1977 took $27.2 million in Australian cinemas between its first screening to a paying audience at midnight Wednesday to the last sessions beginning before midnight on Sunday. It also posted the highest theater average for a wide release with $57,568 and marks the biggest December opening of all time.

“They tailored the campaign to every geography around the world, and did it in a way that still preserved some of the mystery of the film while not leaving a single stone unturned”.

The movie itself was well received with a 95 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The family comedy drove its way into a second place finish with $14.4 million from 3,653 theaters.

– First film to reach triple digits ($100M+) in a single day.