That first-day total was double the number of iPhone 4S pre-orders the company took last year, and an initial Friday shippingdate was quickly pushed back.
The May event reportedly will be more of a teaser than a full product unveiling, which could be saved for the large E3 gaming conference in June, with a holiday shippingdate not far behind.
Some folks are reporting that they're already receiving shipping notices even though their estimated delivery date was weeks away, so Apple might just be being overly cautious with its estimates.
To date the mobile industry has flirted with films with Motorola shipping its Z8 handset with The Bourne Identity and Nokia offering users of its N95 8GB model, the Spiderman 3 movie.