Capital Rings Fans Fork Out $1m
Staff Reporter

Wellington moviegoers have spent about $1 million on tickets for The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring since its launch a month ago.

And the film, the first in Wellington director Peter Jackson's $650 million trilogy, continues to attract large audiences going back for a second and third look.

Hoyts Mid-City manager Richard Jennings said it had sold about 50,000 seats for the movie. With an average seat price of $8 that meant about $400,000 had been spent on tickets.

"What is happening now is people are coming back to see it again, or those that have been away on holiday are coming in," he said. "It's pretty good going, but it has a while before it reaches the figures posted by Titanic."

He understood far more people had gone to the Embassy to watch the movie because of its bigger screen.

"We will probably run the movie till April or May because of its popularity."

Embassy theatre manager Robyn Harper said it had sold far more tickets than Mid-City. However, it was theatre policy not to detail sale volumes because the figures were "often distorted". It was pleased with ticket sales and continued to get good crowds.

The Evening Post understands about 80,000 tickets have been sold at the theatre.

Takings in New Zealand are said to be approaching $8 million.

The New Zealand box office record is held by Titanic, which pulled in $12 million.

Meanwhile, The Fellowship Of The Ring has earned $US228.3 ($NZ540 million) in 26 days in North America.

The worldwide total for the movie was projected to exceed $US500 million ($NZ1.2 billion) in ticket sales this week, a spokeswoman for New Line Cinema said.