If selling them this early is "setting it up for a fall," then why did one of the midnight shows in NYC already sell out?

Logic is hard.

Some quick thinking by AMC theater managers got Warner Bros. thinking about selling tickets to the Batman pic well before the July 20 theatrical release.
http://m.hollywoodreporter.com/news/why ... ets-280492
TORONTO - The Dark Knight Rises won't be released until July, but the Christopher Nolan Batman film already has sold out some midnight screenings, thanks to some fast thinking by enterprising theater owners.
The webste /film reported Monday that Fandango quietly had begun selling tickets already, and that midnight screenings in New York and Los Angeles had sold out.

Here's the backstory: Theater chain AMC held a handful of prerelease screenings in December for fanboys to see Paramount’s Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol in the Imax format before the film was released generally. Those screenings included a 6-minute prologue for The Dark Knight Rises on the blown-up Imax screens.

As it happened, some AMC theater managers in New York, Los Angeles and San Fransisco decided to poll the fanboys in attendance on who was interested in buying midnight tickets to see the Batman pic on July 19.
Not surprisingly, the tickets sold out in an instant, even though the latest installment in Warner Bros.' Batman franchise isn’t due out on wide release until July 20.

Based on that on-site demand, Fandango decided to start selling additional midnight tickets for Dark Knight Rises, which features about 40 minutes of footage shot with Imax cameras that is viewed ideally in theaters with 70mm projection technology.

It all fits in with Imax’s strategy of becoming a preferred prerelease window for studio pictures, helping to build buzz before a wide theatrical release.

That would require a 15% increase over Potter. That has never happened with films from year to year. The last film to do that was DMC over Spiderman. But that needed 4 years of inflation, a huge popularity increase, and a dead summer. TDK has reached its peak audience, much more competition, and less than a year of inflation.

I still think it should take the record though. But stay in the 4-8% increase that other films do when its a year later. 180 seems like the magic number for it, but I would not be surprised if it was less.

History will prevail again!

That would require a 15% increase over Potter. That has never happened with films from year to year. The last film to do that was DMC over Spiderman. But that needed 4 years of inflation, a huge popularity increase, and a dead summer. TDK has reached its peak audience, much more competition, and less than a year of inflation.

I still think it should take the record though. But stay in the 4-8% increase that other films do when its a year later. 180 seems like the magic number for it, but I would not be surprised if it was less.

History will prevail again!

Spider-Man increased 27% over Harry Potter 1 despite releasing just 6 months after... what's that about history prevailing again?

Spider-Man increased 27% over Harry Potter 1 despite releasing just 6 months after... what's that about history prevailing again?

Well when I've quoted history, I've never been wrong. If you want to really compare the marketplace from 10 years ago, whatever floats your boat. But since Lost World really started showing the explosion of opening weekends, here are the increases.

Lost World 38% increase
Potter 25.7% increase
Spiderman 27% increase
DMC 18%
Spiderman 3- 11.4%
TDK 4.8%
Potter 6.7%

There is a definite trend showing. The film marketplace just isn't the same it was even 5 years ago. Potter had a lot of momentum, inflation, and 3D going for yet. Yes this is the last Nolan Batman, but it would be hard to argue on the opening weekend perspective that TDKR is more hyped than the last Potter. With the way the industry is changing. late 90s being the amount of screens a film could be shown on, and with the last decade turning the film industry into a world wide success that it never saw before, sadly it seems like we are going to be past those huge increase periods.

Potters record is false, there hasn't been a film to break TDKs record in going on 4 years now.

By the time of release TDKR will be the most anticipated movie ever. It will be like if Episode 1 was released during todays internet era.

I can no longer follow this thread, so I'm going to make three statements:
1) The Dark Knight sold more tickets on OW than Spider-Man 3. This is a pure fact and will never change, ever.

2) There are more people willing to see a Batman film in theaters than there are for Harry Potter films. Even the final Potter could not sell more tickets on OW than The Dark Knight, and it came up well short of its total.

3) There is no historical precedent for a film coming off a $500+ million grosser with such incredible WOM. The closest thing you're going to get is Spider-Man 3 or else you have to go so far back that any comparison is null and void.

Well when I've quoted history, I've never been wrong. If you want to really compare the marketplace from 10 years ago, whatever floats your boat. But since Lost World really started showing the explosion of opening weekends, here are the increases.

Lost World 38% increase
Potter 25.7% increase
Spiderman 27% increase
DMC 18%
Spiderman 3- 11.4%
TDK 4.8%
Potter 6.7%

There is a definite trend showing. The film marketplace just isn't the same it was even 5 years ago. Potter had a lot of momentum, inflation, and 3D going for yet. Yes this is the last Nolan Batman, but it would be hard to argue on the opening weekend perspective that TDKR is more hyped than the last Potter. With the way the industry is changing. late 90s being the amount of screens a film could be shown on, and with the last decade turning the film industry into a world wide success that it never saw before, sadly it seems like we are going to be past those huge increase periods.