“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Breaks Box Office Records!; $238 Million Domestic And $517 Million Globally!

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

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Records Fall As STAR WARS: THE FORCE AWAKENS Posts $238M Domestic, $517M Global Debut

The Walt Disney Studios announced today that Star Wars: The Force Awakens has set a new all-time domestic debut record with an estimated $238M. With a five-day international debut of $279M, the film has taken in $517M globally.

“Our sole focus has been creating a film that delivers that one-of-a-kind Star Wars experience, and director J.J. Abrams, Lucasfilm President Kathleen Kennedy, and the Lucasfilm team have outdone themselves,” said Alan Horn, Chairman, The Walt Disney Studios. “To all of the fans around the world who not only came out in Force to make this such an exciting and astronomical debut but who treated this film as their own and helped preserve the experience for their fellow fans by not spoiling it – thank you, we do.”

En route to this galactic launch, the film has smashed several all-time domestic box office records, including:

  • Biggest Thursday preview gross with $57M.
  • Biggest Friday and biggest single-day gross with $120.5M.
  • First film ever to post a single day over $100M.
  • Fastest film to $100M and $200M.
  • Biggest December debut (nearly 3 times previous record of $84.6M).
  • Biggest IMAX Thursday night preview ($5.7M), single-day ($14M, Friday), and weekend ($30.1M).
  • Highest theater average for a wide release ($57,568).

Star Wars: The Force Awakens debuted day-and-date internationally in nearly every market (except Greece and India, which open Dec. 24, and China, which opens Jan. 9) and set records in many. Highlights:

  • Biggest opening weekend of all time in UK (4-day), Australia, Russia, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Austria, Poland (3-day), Denmark (5-day), Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, Croatia, Ukraine, Iceland, Serbia, New Zealand. Second biggest opening weekend in France, Belgium, Israel, Chile.
  • Biggest IMAX global debut of $48M.

The Force is strong with critics and audiences, whose enthusiastic reactions have powered a 95% Rotten Tomatoes score and an excellent A CinemaScore, with an A+ among women and younger audiences, for Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

UPDATE: Additional box office data for The Force Awakens and box office records data provided by BoxOfficeMojo.com:

In just its first day of release Force Awakens brought in an estimated $120.5 million setting a new record for the largest Friday, opening day and single day. All on its own, that opening day was also enough to break the previous December opening weekend record of $84.62 million set by The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in 2012. Additionally, the film now holds the following domestic records:

* The Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 record included midnight only screenings while Force Awakens screenings began at 7 PM on Thursday and included Star Wars marathon ticket sales, tickets that were sold for as much as $59.99 each.
** Holiday is defined as the first Friday in November through New Year’s week or weekend.

Domestically, Force Awakens did fall short of a few records such as the largest Saturday and Sunday totals, both held by Jurassic World. Subsequent weekend records, however, are still up for grabs along with the fastest to $300 million and so on, not to mention the overall domestic record currently held by Avatar at $760.5 million.

“Jurassic World” Congratulates New Box Office Champ, “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

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Members of the “Jurassic World” team, including Steven Spielberg, Frank Marshal and Colin Treverrow, went out of their way to congratulate the new box office champ, “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” for their amazing accomplishment.

Bob Iger confirmed that the record breaking numbers that were announced over the weekend were actually somewhat conservative and that “The Force Awakens” beat Jurassic Worlds global box office record of $524 million, with “TFA” pulling in an revised estimated $528 million. The domestic return is going to be closer to $250 million.

Source: Frank Marshall at Twitter

VIDEO: This Little Girl Has The Cutest Reaction To “Star Wars: The Force Awakens”

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

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Star Wars fans come in all ages as shown in this great video of a little girl seeing her favorite characters for the first time. Note: This girl is a fan from playing with a “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” sticker book with her dad, she has not seen the movie. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf2c_lY7QS0

This was posted on Reddit and here is her father’s response and explanation of his daughters happiness and enthusiasm:

Dad here. Weird to fire up reddit and see your kids face. Made me do a double-take. I’m glad this video is making a lot of people smile, I thought her reaction really captured how I felt on the inside about the new film.

Regarding a lot of the coaching comments…

The only exposure to Star Wars my daughter had prior to seeing the trailer was a Star Wars The Force Awakens sticker book. We spent a lot of time peeling off the stickers and she would say: “Who is this?” and I would tell her, and she would stick it in the book. She liked it so much when we ran out of stickers I got some more and now the book is totally coated in stickers. She just got really excited seeing those sticker characters come to life. I think she was looking around like that because she couldn’t believe we weren’t flipping out the same way 🙂

Also, she hasn’t seen the film. She loves the trailers because they’re short and sweet but feature length films are too long / too much dialogue to keep her attention. One day soon I hope 🙂

If you haven’t gone to seen the film yet, it’s great. I hope it makes you smile as big as this video makes me smile.

Source: Reddit

 

“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” Is The Fastest Movie To Reach $1 Billion At The Worldwide Box Office

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

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“Star Wars: The Force Awakens” continues to break box office records and has just reached a very important milestone in making over $1 billion in just 12 days. So will this movie break Avatar’s record of $2,787,965,087? It still has a few hurdles ahead of it but it’s on a really good pace. Keep in mind that “The Force Awakens” still hasn’t opened in China, which helped Avatar pull in $204 million.

Right now, “The Force Awakens” is ranked #15 in the Top Worldwide Grossing Movies Of All Time! “The Force Awakens” can only go up from here, but how far up? Do you think it will break Avatar’s record?

All Time Worldwide Box Office Grosses:

(Provided by Box Office Mojo)

Rank Title Studio Worldwide Domestic / % Overseas / % Year^
1 Avatar Fox $2,788.0 $760.5 27.3% $2,027.5 72.7% 2009^
2 Titanic Par. $2,186.8 $658.7 30.1% $1,528.1 69.9% 1997^
3 Jurassic World Uni. $1,669.0 $652.3 39.1% $1,016.7 60.9% 2015
4 Marvel’s The Avengers BV $1,519.6 $623.4 41.0% $896.2 59.0% 2012
5 Furious 7 Uni. $1,515.0 $353.0 23.3% $1,162.0 76.7% 2015
6 Avengers: Age of Ultron BV $1,405.0 $459.0 32.7% $946.0 67.3% 2015
7 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 WB $1,341.5 $381.0 28.4% $960.5 71.6% 2011
8 Frozen BV $1,276.5 $400.7 31.4% $875.7 68.6% 2013
9 Iron Man 3 BV $1,215.4 $409.0 33.7% $806.4 66.3% 2013
10 Minions Uni. $1,157.3 $336.0 29.0% $821.2 71.0% 2015
11 Transformers: Dark of the Moon P/DW $1,123.8 $352.4 31.4% $771.4 68.6% 2011
12 The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King NL $1,119.9 $377.8 33.7% $742.1 66.3% 2003^
13 Skyfall Sony $1,108.6 $304.4 27.5% $804.2 72.5% 2012
14 Transformers: Age of Extinction Par. $1,104.1 $245.4 22.2% $858.6 77.8% 2014
15 Star Wars: The Force Awakens BV $1,090.6 $544.6 49.9% $546.0 50.1% 2015

A “Star Wars Land” Float Will Make An Appearance In This Year’s Tournament Of Roses Parade

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

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Could this year’s Rose Parade give us a better idea of what to expect from Star Wars Land? Probably not, but the hype will begin at the the 127th Annual Rose Parade this Friday!

From Disney Insider:

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Additional photos from MakingStarWars.net:

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The 127th Tournemnet Of Roses Parade will air this January 1st at 11AM on ABC and also at 11:30AM on NBC.

Source: Disney Insider, Making Star Wars

Zootopia Preview Coming to Hollywood Studios, California Adventure; New Trailer Released

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

Guests at Disney Parks here in the U.S. will soon be getting an exclusive preview of Walt Disney Pictures latest animated release, Zootopia, in theaters March 4th. At Disney California Adventure Park, the “Zootopia” preview will be presented at the Bug’s Life Theater with special in-theater effects. Guests at Disney’s Hollywood Studios will get to see this advance look at clips from the film as the end film of the One Man’s Dream attraction.

The Zootopia preview at Walt Disney World was expected to take home in the Magic Eye Theater at Epcot, but it appears the new Disney and PIXAR Short Film Festival will be a more permanent offering than we expected.

Today, Walt Disney Animation Studios has released a brand new trailer for their upcoming animated film as well:

The modern mammal metropolis of Zootopia is a city like no other. Comprised of habitat neighborhoods like ritzy Sahara Square and frigid Tundratown, it’s a melting pot where animals from every environment live together—a place where no matter what you are, from the biggest elephant to the smallest shrew, you can be anything. But when rookie Officer Judy Hopps (voice of Ginnifer Goodwin) arrives, she discovers that being the first bunny on a police force of big, tough animals isn’t so easy. Determined to prove herself, she jumps at the opportunity to crack a case, even if it means partnering with a fast-talking, scam-artist fox, Nick Wilde (voice of Jason Bateman), to solve the mystery.

Walt Disney Animation Studios’ “Zootopia,” a comedy-adventure directed by Byron Howard and Rich Moore and co-directed by Jared Bush, opens in theaters on March 4, 2016.

Mark Hamill Confirms Luke Skywalker Will Be In “Star Wars: Episode VIII”

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

Even though he gets credited in the official Star Wars: The Force Awakens poster and has appeared at a number of live events in celebration of the sequel, Mark Hamill recently admitted in an interview that he has never officially been allowed to say that he is in the movie. That changes today, as he used his Official Twitter account to confirm that he will once again reprise JediMaster Luke Skywalker in Star Wars: Episode VIII, which kicks off the summer 2017 movie going season.

 

Source: Movieweb.com

 

REVIEW: “Put Me in the Story – Star Wars: The Force Inside” np

WDWNT on November 13, 2015

Put Me in the Story is a popular line of best selling personalized books for kids. We had the chance to review Marvel’s The Avengers: Black Ops Field Guide a few months ago, and now, just in time for The Force Awakens, we had the opportunity to review a copy of Star Wars: The Force Inside.
The process for ordering any Put Me in the Story book is quick, easy and fun via the Put Me in the Story website. Just a few quick steps of typing your child’s name, adding a short book dedication and uploading two photos of your child and you are done. This can be done as either a surprise for your child, or include them in the process by having them choose two of their favorite photos!
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I decided to have Jedi Master Mace Windu write out a dedication to one of his favorite Jedi… me! The process of personalizing the book really adds to the excitement of waiting to receive it. And we have had a great experience with super fast shipping, so you will not have to wait long after ordering.
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The first photo you upload goes onto the dedication page. The second photo goes on a page in the middle of the book. When you receive the book, you will notice that it is a high quality hard cover book. Which it good, because if your kids are like me when I was a youngling, they will be flipping through it over and over and over again.
The best part in my opinion is that there are two sides to the book… “Path of the Jedi” and “Path of the Sith.” So depending on which cover you start with, you can choose the dark side or the light. The covers have well designed graphics on them with either Jedi or Sith characters. Your child’s name is also on both covers.
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Once you choose your side, you will go through a series of pages with characters and questions on the them. Luke, Yoda, Obi-Wan and more populate the Jedi side with Vader, The Inquisitor and Darth Maul among others on the Sith side.
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On one page you will find a character bio and attribute chart. On the opposite page, is a short quiz to test your dedication to the dark or light side. For each page, you add up the numbers next to the answers you choose, and at the book’s half way point, you total up your points for your Jedi or Sith score. On that middle page is also where your second photo appears.
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Overall, the presentation is wonderful. There are a ton of great graphics and character photos with a layout that invites repeated readings. Just that alone would have me flipping though the pages, but the fact that I can interact with the book by making up my own stories based on the quizzes inside is what makes this book a true winner. It is something I would reference and revisit over and over again as a young padawan in training for a life of Star Wars geekdom ahead.
Click here to check out the Star Wars: The Force Inside book for yourself.