Star Wars: The Force Awakens Predicted To Shatter Box Office Records With $615 Million Plus Global Opening

A short time from now, the current box office record will be blown, blown away. This December, Star Wars: The Force Awakens is going undoubtedly shatter box office records, but by how much?

Many experts are predicting The Force Awakens is capable of bringing in $615 million worldwide in its opening weekend.

Let's put that into perspective:

• Jurassic World recently broke the record for biggest worldwide opening weekend with $524.4 million
• Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope took in $460 million domestically in its entire box office run, $775 worldwide
• $615 million is just under a quarter of Avatar's all-time worldwide gross record - in just one weekend!

The Force Awakens is poised to awaken the box office force which is Star Wars. The franchise has been theatrically dormant for 10 years, now, since Episode III's 2005 release. Let's not forget, we're also very hungry for another good Star Wars movie, which, with JJ Abrams at the helm, should be what we're getting here, kicking off another trilogy accompanied by solo films such as Rogue One.

The Force Awakens is not only the relaunching of the franchise in theaters, but it's the long-awaited sequel to Return of the Jedi. Return of the Jedi came out in 1983. That's 32 years of anticipation. 32 years of waiting, wearing Star Wars t-shirts, and parents showing the original Lucasfilm products to kids. The movie has multi-generational appeal. Kids, parents, grandparents... They're all going to the movies together to see so much of the original cast returning.

The difference between now and the time the original Star Wars trilogy released is how simple it is for a movie theater to cancel a screening of say, Victor Frankenstein which will have been playing for a month come The Force Awakens' opening weekend, and play Episode VII in its place. Theaters won't say, "Sorry, we're sold out," but instead, they'll shout, "Get Star Wars on another screen!" Experts are expecting Star Wars to screen on over 4,000 screens in its opening run, much like the current opening weekend record holder, Jurassic World, which played on 4,274.

To check out the highest grossing films of all time, head over to our Movie Database.

(via Deadline)