This Is It Sells 250 Million in 5 Days
The incredible ticket sales for the film This Is It around the world have been heard like a bomb.
In the UK, more than 12,000 tickets have been pre-sold so far by two of the biggest cinemas. The film’s first-day sales broke the records of the Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings franchises—two cinema giants. The Adion Cinema sold 35,000 tickets for This Is It in its first 24 hours. That figure is 5 times the first-day sales of Harry Potter and The Command of the Grizzly? (The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King?)
According to the cinema owner, such sales show how eager people are to watch the film. And according to some others, this film is an opportunity to pay tribute to Michael and honor him.
Reuters reports that pre-sales for This Is It have made it one of the hottest films of the year worldwide. Two weeks before its release, tickets for the film completely disappeared in the United States for more than 1,600 showtimes. In the past week, the film has been number one on the two main online ticket sales sites, Fandango and MovieTickets. Such sales place the film in the same category as Twilight, which has left many people waiting.
A spokesperson for Columbia Pictures says that pre-sales for the film around the world are unbelievable. To meet the high demand from people across the world, cinemas have decided to increase the number of showtimes.
Right now, This Is It is number one on the online ticket sales site Fandango.com and has knocked out all other films this week. On its own, the film has sold more than 1,000 showtimes on this site in the United States, and it has beaten the previous record-holder, Hannah Montana, by a ratio of two to one.
MovieTickets.com also reported that tickets for 600 showtimes have completely sold out.
Both of these sites say This Is It is turning into the best-selling film in the history of their existence.
Currently, the film is ahead of Harry Potter, Transformers 2, and Star Trek as this year’s top performers. In the United States and Canada, it will be shown in about 3,500 cinemas. And in 75 countries around the world, about 8,500 cinemas will host viewers for this film.
AEG has predicted that, considering the ticket pre-sale record, this film will sell $250 million in its first five days of release. That figure is more than the sales made by the Harry Potter and Spider-Man film series over the same period.
However, Sony is worried that the frenzy around the This Is It sales record will make people think that all tickets are already sold out. But the reality is that people can still visit box offices during the film’s run and buy tickets.
AEG has revealed that the exact and professional recording of rehearsals, behind-the-scenes preparation, the selection of the dance group and singers, and the rest of the process were done because Michael wanted to have a complete archive of every stage of this tour. Michael’s intention was to make a live performance album, a film, and a TV documentary from these rehearsals.
The cost of this was more than the $25 million budget of the company. But Michael wasn’t thinking about the budget. AEG stopped HD recording of rehearsals to reduce costs by using standard recording, because it wasn’t clear whether the recorded films would even be used.
Immediately after Michael’s death, a meeting was held at the Staples Center, where rehearsals had taken place, to decide how to use the more than 100 hours of recorded rehearsal footage.
Randy Phillips, CEO of AEG, says Michael is their partner. Whether he’s alive or dead.
This 112-minute film will be shown in theaters worldwide for two weeks starting October 28.
Source: eMJey / deadline.com / BBC / Reuters