MUMBAI: Warner Bros. Pictures has opened Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in 4,285 locations and over 9,000 screens in the US. As part of this opening, the film is being shown digitally on 579 screens in 325 locations, more than any Warner Bros. film to date.
With showings in many cities starting at midnight, the film also has the largest number of day-and-date international openings of any film in the franchise, with simultaneous releases in 44 markets worldwide from 11 July. This far surpasses any of the previous Harry Potter release patterns, almost doubling the 24-market release pattern of the previous record holder Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
In addition, Warner Bros. has generated the greatest overall number of prints for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with over 22,000 prints going to exhibitors around the world. Internationally, it is also the largest digital cinema release to date for any Warner Bros. title with over 750 screens.
On the Imax front the film is breaking industry records, going up on more Imax screens than any previous release. The film opened on 126 Imax screens worldwide – 91 of those in the US, with many featuring the final scenes of the film in Imax 3D.
In the film Harry returns for his fifth year of study at Hogwarts only to discover that much of the wizarding community has been led to believe that the story of the teenager‘s recent encounter with the evil Lord Voldemort is a lie, putting Harry‘s integrity in question. Worse, the Minister for Magic, Cornelius Fudge, has appointed a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, the duplicitous Professor Dolores Umbridge.
But Professor Umbridge‘s "Ministry-approved" course of defensive magic leaves the young wizards woefully unprepared to defend themselves against the Dark forces threatening them, so, at the prompting of his friends Hermione and Ron, Harry is convinced to take matters into his own hands.
Meeting secretly with a small group of students who name themselves "Dumbledore‘s Army," Harry teaches them how to defend themselves against the Dark Arts, preparing the courageous young wizards for the extraordinary battle that lies ahead.
