35,000 advance tickets sold for Star Wars in UAE

Star Wars fans in the UAE have bought Dh2 million worth of advance tickets for this week’s release — but that’s still not the biggest advance sales UAE cinemas have seen, tabloid! can reveal.

That equates to a whopping 35,000 advance tickets sold ahead of the film’s UAE release at midnight on December 17.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens may be huge — it’s broken advance sales records around the world — but it did not beat local distributor Italia Film Middle East’s highest record of 60,000 tickets.

That was for Furious 7, which released in the UAE on April 2 this year. Like Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Furious 7 was filmed in Abu Dhabi with local production house TwoFour 54.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens has already surpassed $50 million in advance ticket sales in the US. Predictions of its opening weekend in the US are ranging from $170 million to $240 million, according to The Hollywood Reporter, meaning the film might beat Avatar’s record of $2.8 billion for worldwide grosses.

Locally, “Star Wars: The Force Awakens has reported the highest number of advanced bookings in the history of Reel Cinemas,” said a spokesperson for the cinema chain, which has halls in Dubai, although “this does also correlate to a growing trend of people who prefer to book movies in advance”.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens has been rated PG13 in the UAE, meaning younger Star Wars fans will be able to enjoy the movie when accompanied by a guardian over the at of 13.

Cinemas across the UAE will not only be packed with Star Wars fans: Two massive Bollywood films, Dilwale and Bajirao Mastani, are also being released. Advance tickets for both movies have been on sale in local cinemas for months now.

At Reel Cinemas, “Diwale is currently ahead of Bajirao in ticket pre-sales. This has been interesting to watch as it is the first time that two huge Bollywood hits have been released at the same time and are competing in terms of ticket sales”.

“All three movies are expected to do very well,” said a Novo Cinemas rep. “The movies cater to different audiences and genres of movie watchers. Response from the patrons for advance booking has been tremendous and these movies will do well across the region.”

Vox Cinemas would not comment on how strong advance ticket sales for the three movies has been.

— Farah Ahmed is an intern at Gulf News.