Star Wars tickets trump election for avid film fans
Election? What election? For thousands of moviegoers, the Liberals’ victory on Oct. 19 was eclipsed by their enthusiasm for another outof-this-world revelation — Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Response to the start of advance ticket sales for director J.J. Abrams’ sci-fi epic — described by media analyst Paul Dergarabedian as “maybe the most anticipated movie of the past 10 years” — was swift and huge. So many fans across North America went online at once that ticketselling servers in the U.S. crashed.
“I started camping out at Cineplex around 6:30,” said Edward Sum, who snapped up two of the first available tickets released after a new two-minute trailer premièred during a football game broadcast.
Sum, an online entertainment journalist and self-described “geek”, didn’t camp out at SilverCity, one of the theatres that will screen the film that officially opens Dec. 18. He was one of thousands of Star Wars fans from coast to coast who camped out digitally at Cineplex.com.
Sum scored tickets for the 3-D version in SilverCity’s Imax theatre on Dec. 17 at 7 p.m.
Such previews the night before have replaced “midnight” screen- ings on the eve of a film’s opening day that theatre chains used to present.
“It’s not like the good old days when you’d have to camp out at the theatre’s box office,” said Sum, who saw the original Star Wars at the Odeon and The Empire Strikes Back at the Royal Theatre.
“I just waited for people to say who won the election,” said Sum, who voted in advance so he could focus on buying Star Wars tickets.
Realizing online presales would start about 6:30 p.m., Leah Rooper, 25, said she kept refreshing her computer at that time. She bought six tickets for her and her sister Kate, 23. “We had the election on in the background, but I was more stressed out about Star Wars,” Leah said with a laugh.
“The response was fantastic and we’re so happy that fans are as excited as we are to see Star Wars: Episode VII on the big screen this December,” said Pat Marshall, Cineplex Entertainment’s vice-president communications and investor relations.
“We have a number of sold-out screenings at theatres across Canada, including some at SilverCity Victoria.”
Moviegoers will still have access to plenty of tickets at cineplex.com, and Marshall encouraged fans to buy in advance online to avoid disappointment.
But why book tickets for such a movie two months before it even opens in theatres where plenty of seats will eventually become available?
“Bragging rights mostly,” Sum replied.