SHANGHAI, April 19 -- Columbia Pictures' Spider-Man 3 will make its debut in Shanghai as well as other parts of the country on May 2, two days ahead of its North American release.

City cinemas are all prepared to screen the movie including the United Cinema Lines, the city's biggest theater chain and Peace Cinema, which will screen the film 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 had 50 copies for the movie.

According to China Film Group Corporation, it has prepared 500 copies of the movie, the most-ever for a foreign movie.

Directed by Sam Raimi, the movie is the third of the Spider Man series with the same leading actor Tobey Maguire and actress Kirsten Dunst.

Its plot is a mix of 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 is even involved in love triangle.

Compared with the previous two movies, the Spider Man 3 has several scenes of the hero crying, which show his inner struggle more vividly and make him seem more human.

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

``The ticket price will be the same of for other foreign movies,'' Wu said.

The World Premiere was held in Tokyo on April 16.

Spider Man was firstly screened in August 2002. In June 2004, Spider Man 2 was released. Both the movies had good box office.