The Force Is Strong: ‘Star Wars’ Smashes Records On Opening Day

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” made domestic box office history, bringing in an estimated $238 million in its opening weekend, rocketing past the previous record of $208.8 million held by “Jurassic World”. Although show after show is sold out, Disney keeps stressing that tickets are still available.

Force Awakens, unlike Jurassic World, didn’t have the advantage of opening day and date in China, where it doesn’t open until January 9.

The seventh instalment of the Star Wars cinematic series is projected to record a US$250 million global four-day opening weekend, with $220 million coming from the American and Canadian markets.

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” surpassed the previous record by over $19 million (16.6 million euros) industry monitor Rentrak said Sunday.

In addition, The Force Awakens also landed the biggest weekend opening in Australia, Russia, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Austria, Poland (3-day), Denmark (5-day), Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Croatia, Ukraine, Iceland, Serbia, New Zealand. The film, which carries a production cost of at least $200 million, opened in most other markets Friday.

The highly anticipated space epic already smashed the opening night record in the United States and Canada when it grossed $57 million Thursday.

Analyst Alexia Quadrani thinks Disney may be able to recoup the roughly US$4 billion it paid for Star Wars creator Lucasfilm by 2018.

More importantly, the film sets the scene for more sequels to come, not to mention multimedia spinoffs and merchandising.

“Force Awakens” takes place 30 years after the conclusion of 1983’s “Return of the Jedi”.

“At this rate, there’s no telling how high Force Awakens will ultimately fly in terms of box-office revenue, since films over the year-end holidays can see huge multiples”, she said, citing James Cameron’s film Avatar, which eventually raked in $2.79bn (£1.82bn) around the world.

After fielding questions, Obama concluded the press conference: “OK everybody, I got to get to ‘Star Wars'”.

The Force Awakens crowd was also perhaps slightly older than may have been expected. Soon to begin was a screening of the film for families who have lost a relative to combat or service-related injuries.