- Title: USA: STAR WARS FILM FANS WAIT ONE MORE NIGHT BEFORE RELEASE OF NEW STAR WARS FILM
- Date: 22nd May 1999
- Summary: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES (MAY 18, 1999) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) EXTERIOR MANN'S CHINESE THEATER MOVIE MARQUEE SANDWICH SELLER HAWKING "STAR WARS" SANDWICHES "STAR WARS" MOVIE POSTER FAN DRESSED UP LIKE YODA FANS WAITING IN LINE, ONE SLEEPING SIGN SAYING "ONE DAY LEFT UNTIL EPISODE ONE" (SOUNDBITE) (ENGLISH) FAN SAYING This is like a religion, you know,
- Embargoed: 6th June 1999 13:00
- Keywords:
- Location: LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES AND VARIOUS FILM LOCATIONS
- Country: USA
- Topics: Entertainment
- Reuters ID: LVA32SWLUC42E6615CVWL5DJKP0V
- Story Text: Star Wars fanatics dressed as Jedi Knights and wielding light-sabres, have spent their final day in line eagerly awaiting the toll of midnight, when they will at last be able to see "Episode I -- The Pantom Menace."
Judgment day looms at last for the movie-making empire of George Lucas, and Hollywood's biggest question will finally be answered -- how much money will his latest "Star Wars" epic make? The barrage of newspaper and TV stories hyping "Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace" has been seemingly nonstop, the reviews are mixed, the star-filled premiere showings are completed and the film opens to the public nationwide at a minute past midnight (0701GMT) Wednesday (May 19).
Those who have waited on line for tickets for two months can now take down their tents, roll up their sleeping bags and perhaps look forward to a return to the real world.
At Mann's Chinese Theatre in Hollywood, where the first line for tickets spontaneously sprouted in early April, fans were variously fatigued and transformed by the wait.
"It's an omen for all of us to get our lives in order,"
said a schoolteacher who was five when the first Star Wars entered his orbit.
Nearby, another fan was more pragmatic."I'm very bored.I'm hot, I'm very bored, and I want the movie to start so I can go home and sleep."
Industry pundits are confident that "The Phantom Menace"
will break records for biggest single day, weekend, five-day holiday and first-week box office standards.
Currently, Universal's "The Lost World: Jurassic Park"
holds those records with respective grosses of $26.1 million (usd), $72.1 million (usd), $98.8 million (usd) and $104.9 million (usd).
Though the exact number of theaters and screens for "Phantom Menace" are still pending, a movie theater chain source claimed that distributor Fox has mapped out a release process that will ensure at least 35 million seats available during the five-day launch.
"Phantom Menace" is the chance to see how it all began -- how the seeds of treachery were planted in hero Luke Skywalker's father, leading him to become the villainous Darth Vader, and how Jedi master Obi-Wan Kenobi learned to wield his light sabre and feel the omnipotent power of the "Force. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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