that seems like a very good opening, but is it true that WOM isn't that good?

I have no idea. But I will say to take any reports of poor WOM and/or reviews at this stage with a grain of salt. It seems like every film receives these initial reports these days and they wind up being nonsense. I think it's just a very small vocal crowd that jumps on social media ASAP to spread it for some reason (clicks and likes, I guess).

The First Slam Dunk and Suzume are the perfect examples of this. Both had early "bad/mixed" reception reports, and look what happened to them. They both went on to give two of the longest/leggiest performances ever (Slam Dunk is still playing wide in its 33rd week) and have high audience scores. And Slam Dunk won the Japan Academy Prize for an Animated film too.

Mimorin projects the equivalent of a ¥860,000,000 Saturday for Miyazaki's movie.

Early Saturday projection

Thanks!
Also new information

"In keeping with Ghibli’s Japan omerta, Gkids says it will not release any further details or marketing materials at the moment."

It won't go that high, but sales are looking good so far.

How Mimorin projects a total for the day is by calculating current admissions and projecting a final total off that based on the past daily trends of the movie. But for openers, it doesn't work accurately yet because Saturday performs much differently than Friday. Saturday morning/afternoon sales are much stronger while evening/night sales are somewhat comparable. So, the system thinks the film is going to see big gains in the evening/night again like it did on Friday when it won't.

Does that make sense? Tried to explain it as simple as I could.

Best means of trying to predict the day before it concludes is by looking at the current admissions and comparing them to the same point yesterday.

Bit of a meh saturday bump more in line with your numbers - AEON jumped great, but I expected that sort of jump for the total :/

Still a solid saturday overall I suppose

Luiz on twitter estimates the OW for How Do You Live? to be around ¥1.57B.

I won't care about Luiz. Waiting for @Eigarankingnews Update

Busy weekend, but here are my estimates:

¥450m (Fri)
¥510m (Sat)
¥565m (Sun)

OW: ¥1.525b.

It's nice that Sunday increased. Not unusual since it's before a holiday Monday, but it's still not always guaranteed for openers. Sat+Sun on par with Miyazaki's average since 2001. Admissions will likely be a little lower, but nothing really worrisome here. And it's hard to say what Friday business would have gone to Sat/Sun since this is the first Miyazaki film to open on a Friday.

Since Japan is on 3-day OWs now, unless actual come in lower, it's officially going to become Miyazaki's biggest opener.

And with a holiday Monday that is likely to be just as big as Sat or Sun, it's likely exceeding ¥2 billion in four days. Very impressive. If Monday happens to increase, we'll be in especially good shape as that'd indicate good WOM and a sizable family turn out which is important during summer vacation.

Spirited Away opened on Friday (20th July, 2001)

07/20 - ¥550,777,550 / 433,070 admits
07/21 - ¥516,310,000 / 371,192 admits
07/22 - ¥578,099,500 / 427,086 admits

3-Days WKend - ¥1,645,187,050 / 1,231,348 admits

I am confused now.

You're right. Still so easy to forget that since the 3-day wasn't widely reported since rankings were 2-day only. I don't even have it on my 3-day chart!
(Will add it this week!)

So, How Do You Live? roughly on par with both Sat and Sun, but a lower Friday. That Friday for Spirited Away is pretty crazy. Friday is almost never the biggest daily (admissions in this case) unless a holiday is in play.

Although, SA's Friday might have been as summer vacation was already ongoing, and not the Friday before summer vacation like HDYL. Major difference there.

And still... The change to 3-day technically gives HDYL the biggest OW for Miyazaki. I know, not really fair, but it'll be official and reported as such.

Limited shows seems to be an issue. Many customers are complaining about less shows (specially AEON &UNITED). I wonder how they will maintain shows for coming MI debut. Independent are doing excellent whether it's Cinema Sunshine, Shinjuku Wald 9 or Cinema City.

Cinema Sunshine

FRI - 4,896
SAT - 10,484 (+114.13%)
SUN -11,244 (+007.25%)

AEON Cinema (95 TC)

FRI - 50,373/208,579 (623 shows)
SAT- 67,104/207,946 (621 shows)
SUN 78,520/208,389 (623 shows)

That ATG transition was so crazy Princess Mononoke took, then Titanic again back to Spirited Away

Spirited Away did lose on Saturday to OD (kinda feel abnormal but may be it's the beginning of biggest run in History)

Won't see those days again.. but I want Miyazaki to win Oscar this time (just got a thought did Suzume got nominated?)

I doubt HDYL losses many seats at all next weekend. Like you said, some locations didn't give it enough already and will probably correct that this week.

M:I has always been a reliably consistent franchise in Japan, but the second film aside, they haven't been especially big (all others grossing ¥4-6b), so I wouldn't anticipate it to impact HDYL much. It's probably not going to beat HDYL's second weekend, for instance, so theaters aren't going to favor it. The "lukewarm" numbers in the US won't help it either.

So, once again, this isn't exactly apples-to-apples since Japan moved to 3-Day Weekends this year. All the others are the list are 2-Day only, which was the official weekend ranking before 2023.

However, we can still compare roughly against past films by using the estimated 2-day gross, but it's not going to be exact either since we don't know where the Friday business would have gone. How much would have gone to Sat/Sun, how much would have gone to Monday or later, etc. So it's never going to be perfect.

That said, for a more "comparable" number, I've estimated HDYL? earned roughly ¥1.075 billion / 750,000 admissions on Sat/Sun alone, which puts it on par with Spirited Away, Ponyo, and The Wind Rises (admissions in this one's case). But again, this isn't a perfect comparison to make without knowing how the Friday opening impacted Sat/Sun. Spirited Away might be the best individual comparison in this case since it also opened on a Friday, the only other Ghibli film to do so.

Studio Ghibli Box-Office History

OPENINGS:
¥1.525 billion ($11.1 million) / 1,060,000 - How Do You Live? (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2023)* *Est.*
¥1.483 billion ($14.0 million) / 1,104,980 - Howl's Moving Castle (Hayao Miyazaki, Nov. 2004)
¥1.094 billion ($9.6 million) / 798,278 - Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2001)
¥1.034 billion ($9.8 million) / 812,557 - Ponyo (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2008)
¥960.9 billion ($9.8 million) / 747,454 - The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2013)
¥907.5 million ($7.9 million) / 672,696 - Tales from Earthsea (Goro Miyazaki, July 2006)
¥895.6 million ($10.3 million) / 680,190 - Arrietty (Hiromasa Yonebayashi, July 2010)
¥715.0 million ($6.1 million) / 540,000 - Princess Mononoke (Hayao Miyazaki, July 1997)
¥394.1 million ($3.5 million) / 328,007 - The Cat Returns (Hiroyuki Morita, July 2002)
¥387.5 million ($4.9 million) / 296,006 - From Up on Poppy Hill (Goro Miyazaki, July 2011)
¥378.9 million ($3.7 million) / 285,234 - Memories of Marnie (Hiromasa Yonebayashi, July 2014)
¥284.3 million ($2.9 million) / 222,822 - The Tale of Princess Kaguya (Isao Takahata, Nov. 2013)

*3-Day (2023-Present)

TOTALS:
¥31.68 billion ($261.2 million) / 24.28 million - Spirited Away (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2001)
¥20.18 billion ($173.7 million) / 14.98 million - Princess Mononoke (Hayao Miyazaki, July 1997)
¥19.60 billion ($190.0 million) / 15.50 million - Howl's Moving Castle (Hayao Miyazaki, Nov. 2004)
¥15.50 billion ($156.0 million) / 12.87 million - Ponyo (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2008)
¥12.02 billion ($123.5 million) / 9.72 million - The Wind Rises (Hayao Miyazaki, July 2013)
¥9.25 billion ($111.9 million) / 7.58 million - Arrietty (Hiromasa Yonebayashi, July 2010)
¥7.84 billion ($65.3 million) / 6.18 million - Tales from Earthsea (Goro Miyazaki, July 2006)
¥6.46 billion ($54.4 million) / 5.50 million - The Cat Returns (Hiroyuki Morita, July 2002)
¥4.46 billion ($57.8 million) / 3.55 million - From Up on Poppy Hill (Goro Miyazaki, July 2011)
¥4.45 billion ($32.5 million) / 3.50 million - Porco Rosso (Hayao Miyazaki, July 1992)
¥4.05 billion ($40.3 million) / 3.30 million - Pom Poko (Isao Takahata, July 1994)
¥3.53 billion ($34.0 million) / 2.81 million - Memories of Marnie (Hiromasa Yonebayashi, July 2014)
¥2.85 billion ($29.3 million) / 2.08 million - Whisper of the Heart (Yoshifumi Kondo, July 1995)
¥2.64 billion ($18.2 million) / 2.15 million - Kiki's Delivery Service (Hayao Miyazaki, July 1989)
¥2.38 billion ($23.2 million) / 1.99 million - The Tale of Princess Kaguya (Isao Takahata, Nov. 2013)
¥1.87 billion ($11.4 million) / 2.16 million - Only Yesterday (Isao Takahata, July 1991)
~¥790 million ($7.1 million) / 760,000 - My Neighbors the Yamadas (Isao Takahata, July 1999)
~¥760 million ($3.4 million) / 910,000 - Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind (Hayao Miyazaki, Mar. 1984)
~¥590 million ($4.6 million) / 800,000 - My Neighbor Totoro/Grave of the Fireflies [Double Feature] (Hayao Miyazaki, Isao Takahata, Apr. 1988)
~¥580 million ($3.7 million) / 770,000 - Castle in the Sky (Hayao Miyazaki, Aug. 1986)

The translator of the script / subtitles confirmed that Toshio Suzuki chose the international title The Boy and the Heron https://twitter.com/ryuganji/status/1680032572456460289?s=20

yeah don't think HDYL will lose much either, the holdovers have plenty of seats to give right now. it probably loses a bunch of premiums though since I imagine MI7 will want to atleast split.

I think Mission Impossible will have a very big negative impact on How Do You Live? since Tom Cruise create such a legacy on Top Gun Maverick, but for the first week only. I don't expect this one will have a good leg like Maverick. How Do You Live will eventually craw back in later weeks.

I think both HDYL and MI7 will have strong legs, I don't believe theres much competition for them over the coming weeks.

If HDYL sees a drop in seating, it's going to be very minimal and unimpactful to its performance. This isn't like in the US where one blockbuster opening totally wipes out the seating/showings of another that opened before it. Japan largely bases seating on performance, so if one opened high and is doing well throughout the week, they're not going to see much loss even if another blockbuster opens the next weekend.

This is especially true for Toho releases like HDYL. Since they operate Toho Cinemas (busiest chain), they're not going to cut their own film at their locations for another. Granted, Toho also owns Toho-Towa which will be releasing Mission Impossible, but they receive more of the cut with their solo distributions. If I'm proven wrong, fine, but if any Toho Cinema replaces HDYL with MI on their largest screen this upcoming weekend, I'll be very, very surprised. Worst-case: They'll share the largest screen at a few locations.

There are plenty of older holdovers to cut to free up more seating for both of them, along with the many upcoming early August releases.

And this summer, especially July, isn't even as crowded as we've seen this time of year. We've had many more blockbusters opening either against one another or back-to-back-back for a month and they've all done well because these next 6 weeks at the strongest at the box office.

I'm obviously very interested in Elemental's performance here, even if I know it could be disappointing.

I heard from a user on another site that there's an industry expectation that Elemental will make 1.2 billion yen in its entire run in Japan... I certainly hope it does a bit better.

Suzume is eligible for Oscars next year, as it was released in theaters this year in the USA.

How Do You Live?

$13,215,000 via ComScore - IMAX $1.7M

¥1.8B+ accordingly -

IMAX is said to be new record. But, unless broken into JPY, it's hard to believe (For example, Demon Slayer did $2.3M at 38 locations)

¥1.8 billion+ itself is hard to believe.

Giving it a higher than average rural share of ticket sales to take it up to 1.1m+ admissions, its avg. ticket price would have to be comfortably above ¥1600. I know it had a lot of premium shows this weekend, but breaking ¥1600 is pretty rare. Excluding specialty releases, Avatar 2 and Top Gun 2 are the only recent films I can think of that did it.

Obviously ¥1.8 billion would be amazing, and I hope it does come in there! Haha. ¥1.5 billion is still great, but jumping up to ¥1.8 billion takes it up quite a bit in terms of impressiveness.

Ticket Inflation is up by ¥100 in almost all chains now. So, I don't think impossible but yet I know it's looking hard to believe. But, ComScore had it at 9th Global Start. I guess Corpse you can all access their Global Weekend Chart which is free to view for everyone.

But, whatever that's a nice jump