Star Wars: The Force Awakens is already shaping up to be the second-largest, if not the largest, box office hit in Australia, according to cinema bosses, who expect it will break the $100 million mark. 
Pre-sales for the hotly anticipated movie, which premieres in Sydney on Wednesday night, already exceed $15 million, with Hoyts chief executive Damian Keogh predicting it will break the first-week box office record held by Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows Part 2, which grossed $29.3 million.
Experts are predicting Star Wars' latest instalment will reach first-week sales of between $35 million and $40 million.
"The pre-sales and anticipation for Star Wars suggest it will be at least the second-biggest box office movie ever in Australia, if not the [biggest]," Mr Keogh told Fairfax Media.
"It is always hard to predict box office, but it would not surprise anyone in the industry if the movie did $100 million plus at the box office.
"Early indications from screenings in the US is that the movie lives up to the hype and delivers.
"There has already been talk of Oscar nominations."
Village Roadshow co-chief executive Graham Burke said his group's cinemas were putting on extra staff in anticipation of their biggest weekend ever.
"For example, our Gold Class cinemas on Saturday - three days out - have already broken a single-day box office record with advance sales. Based on the industry tracking and the bookings, it is going to be awesome," Mr Burke told Fairfax Media.
The current No.2 on the list of Australia's all-time box office hits is Titanic at $57.7 million, well below Avatar which grossed $115.6 million back in 2009 and 2010.
Disney bought Lucasfilm from Star Wars creator George Lucas in 2012 for $US4.05 billion.
The original Star Wars movie, A New Hope, was released in 1977 and the series has grown to epic proportions to include films, music, video games, cartoons and countless forms of merchandise.
The Force Awakens is the first film in 10 years since the final film of the prequel series, The Revenge of the Sith. Critics have often taken aim at the newer films, which began with The Phantom Menace in 1999.
The Force Awakens is the first of six new Star Wars movies to be released at a rate of one per year, with a new trilogy as well as three other stories from the same universe.
It is directed by JJ Abrams, who also directed the new iteration of Star Trek. Anticipation for the film has been so high that when tickets were first released in   October, more than $1 million was racked up in advance ticket sales within a few hours.