So you wouldn't be surprised by it DOUBLING the largest preview number of all time?

That would be $88 million.

No, I'm talking previews. Not the midnight record of DH2.

No, I would not be surprised by that. Sith more than doubled the midnight record.

If Harry Potter had midnights AND earlier 7/8/9/10/11 pm showings, it would have easily topped $50 million four years ago.

It went from $8 mil to $16 mil. That's a huge difference than going from $30 mil to $60 mil.

Also, there's a reason it's "only" $30 mil. TDKR had a huge effect on that.

SW is already going to defy most box office logic. You're all pushing it.

Star Wars defies box-office logic. That's what it does.

Agreed, though one benefit for midnight release is that all screens are available. 7-9 PM shows still have to share screens with the other films. In the case of SW7, this is not much of an issue since they are just going to keep the theaters open all night similar to Potter or other midnight releases.

One nice advantage for SW7 will be the PLF screens that were nowhere near as prevalent in 2011 as they are now. I can think of a theater in the Houston area opened in 2013 and has 6 PLF screens that are each 85 feet wide. Force Awakens will be running the whole night on all 6 of them. Tickets cost 20% more than regular shows.

Silly acronyms. Had to look up PLF

Ha, sorry. For others who aren't aware: PLF is Premium Large Format which is just the theater brand version of IMAX. These are the quickest growing large format screens in the country as theaters would rather come up with their own format instead of pay royalties to the IMAX Corporation. Digital projection technology has been a game-changer in this regard.

20%-25% of the weekend.

$39m previews.

I don't see how it goes below $40M in previews and even that might be lowballing considering the ridiculous amount of 2:00am-6:00am showings. DH2's record seems sure to go down, although since it was an actual midnight release those numbers will remain far more impressive for years to come. I'm going with $45M from previews.

On the PLF/IMAX talk:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/box-office-preview-star-wars-848331

392 IMAX theaters

451 Premium Screens 
146 D-Box Screens

Total - 451 PLF locations + 392 IMAX theaters.  Total Large Screen Format locations - 843. PLUS 146 D-Box Screens, which are usually just a few rows in a regular 3D show but with an amusement park 4D-esque seat that costs ~$23.

This may do $50M in IMAX + PLF (JW did 37.7M) for the OW (25-30M from IMAX, 20-25M PLF).  Massive price boost before we even get into 3D.

$39m is a good increase from previews record. Plus $39m is not WAY far from $45m. I am not sure why Star Wars fans have to make a point that everyone HAS to predict a record number.

Tracking numbers have been way off in the past and the sold out reports are not a measure at all because we are only taking a handful of theaters around. I am going with my gut feeling and would like to be impressed if SW exceeds that.

film already has 120m in pre-sales

50m+ is locked up.

Previews - 50m
OW - 225m

JW did 37m with Imax+PLF. This will easily do 50m+. its playing round the clock in PLF theaters almost everywhere. I saw in one AMC it had sold 45 tickets for 3AM friday night/saturday mornign show. At $23 per ticket its almost $1000 per show even at crazy time and we are still 3 days away from that show !!!

Jurassic World did $18.5 million, no?

Only D-Box is as high as $23 per ticket though I think, and there are usually ~40 D-Box seats in a theater.

Prices for other formats are not nearly as high, but are still greater than standard 3D and in the vicinity of IMAX prices. Here's a chart I made comparing AOU to TFA for prices in different formats aside from D-Box in my area:



And here's an expanded chart for TFA. Includes as many formats as I could find in this area:



Note: I will be tracking SW8&9 prices as well, to be able to compare across the 6 year period.

4 year period...

Please predict $120m for previews then let me make fun of you.