Columbia Pictures' Spider-Man 3 will make its debut in Shanghai and other parts of  China on May 2, two days ahead of its North American release.

City outlets are all prepared to screen the movie, including the United Cinema Lines - Shanghai's biggest theater chain - and Peace Cinema, which will show the movie on an IMAX screen.

"The box office will surely exceed 50 million yuan (US$6.4 million) over the country and is expected to reach 100 million yuan," said Wu Hehu, vice general manager of the United Cinema Lines, which has 50 copies of the movie.

The China Film Group Corporation has prepared 500 copies, the most it has ever done for a foreign movie.

Directed by Sam Raimi, the movie is the third of the Spider Man series and has the same stars, Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst.

Its plot combines secrets, vengeance, love, and forgiveness. In the story, based on the legendary Marvel Comics series, Peter Parker has to overcome his personal demons to handle his duties as a superhero. He even becomes involved in a love triangle.

Compared with the previous two movies, Spider-Man 3 makes the hero more human and in some scenes he crys.

Audiences can choose to see the original edition with subtitles or a dubbed version.

"The ticket price will be the same as for other foreign movies," Wu said.

The world premiere of Spider-Man 3 was held in Tokyo on Monday.

Spider-Man was first screened in August 2002. In June 2004, Spider-Man 2 was released.

(Shanghai Daily April 20, 2007)