If reception are equivalent of Soul, there much be better numbers to arrive with. But, have seen Encanto performance and keep it exclusive on theatre for 30 days didn't help. Crossing Lightyear will enough to call it a success.

JP theaters will give it a shit treatment if it goes to streaming quickly. We've seen this happen over and over with Disney.

Elemental has the most perfect release date really possible in Japan. If it's going to succeed, it's in the best spot to do so. The date suggests Disney is making an attempt to find success for it.

But if a Disney+ release is happening just a month later, it's likely bombs away. Theaters won't book it well at all (as JustLurking said), as many of them (especially Toho) are very anti-streaming and have hit Disney with poor booking in the past if a Disney+ release is announced or coming up soon.

Plus, audiences don't rush to theaters to see movies in Japan... they already wait for Disney releases as is, and if they know it'll only be a month in this case, it'll be even more amplified. It's literally the opposite of what Disney should be doing here...

Trying something new. Weekday Estimates! Not individual days (don't want to add too much to do), but rather what Monday-Thursday roughly grosses for the week.

Note that June weekdays are usually poor, especially for any film that skews younger (weekdays can sometimes just account for 1/4 of the weekly gross for them), so they won't exactly be exciting until summer vacation begins in mid-July.

Weekday Estimates (06/19-22):
¥225 million ($1.6 million) / ¥1.722 billion ($12.1 million) - The Little Mermaid (Disney)
¥166 million ($1.2 million) / ¥1.328 billion ($9.5 million) - Samurai Beyond Admiration Record to the World's Best (Asmi Ace)
¥141 million ($1.0 million) / ¥537 million ($3.8 million) - Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Sony)
¥133 million ($0.9 million) / ¥1.363 billion ($9.7 million) - Mother (Toho)
¥104 million ($0.7 million) / ¥319 million ($2.2 million) - The Flash (Warner Bros.)
¥84 million ($0.6 million) / ¥12.086 billion ($88.1 million) - The Super Mario Bros. Movie (Toho-Towa)
-----
¥47 million ($0.3 million) / ¥13.033 billion ($96.5 million) - Detective Conan: The Black Iron Submarine (Toho)

I also included Detective Conan since it and Super Mario are going to finish pretty close. Advantage Conan as it has almost a ¥1 billion lead. Mario has continued to chip away at it, of course, but I don't think it'll be able to catch up unless its weekends start to deliver consistent sub-20/25% (or better) holds.

The Little Mermaid repeats atop the box office for a third weekend, and unlike it's big second weekend drop, it managed an excellent holds this weekend, likely dropping under 20%. It's just unfortunate the numbers are at the level they are, but hey... don't want to try and spin this as a negative. A strong third weekend like this is encouraging, and not something that any Disney film has really enjoyed since 2019.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie climbs back up to second place in its ninth weekend, delivering a potential sub-15% hold. This is the type of weekend it needs to catch up to Detective Conan, so if we get another one of these next week, we'll probably have a 50/50 race on our hands again.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse takes third or fourth, dropping a little over 50%. Not great, but not unusual for CBMs to drop like this in their second weekend. The Sun-Sun drop of ~39% is encouraging that later drops could improve.

The Flash drops all the way down to 8th/9th place, dropping close to 60%. And Sun-Sun was down ~50%. This is a collapse, and I wouldn't expect its run to last more than 5/6 weeks.

If I have time later, I'll do put together some estimates.

The Flash

WB reported JPY ¥404.9M / USD $2.9M

$14.4M for Mermaid - via Disney

Those match almost exactly what I got with estimates.

Weekend Estimates (06/23-25):
¥344 million ($2.4 million), -15%, ¥2.066 billion ($14.5 million) - The Little Mermaid (Disney) WK3
¥250 million ($1.7 million), -09%, ¥12.336 billion ($89.9 million) - The Super Mario Bros. Movie (Toho-Towa) WK9
¥192 million ($1.3 million), -26% ¥1.520 billion ($10.8 million) - Samurai Beyond Admiration Record to the World's Best (Asmik Ace) WK4
¥186 million ($1.3 million), -53%, ¥623 million ($5.1 million) - Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (Sony) WK2
¥145 million ($1.0 million), NEW, ¥145 million ($1.0 million) - Rascal Does Not Dream of a Sister Venturing Out (Aniplex) NEW
¥137 million ($0.96 million), -20%, ¥1.500 billion ($10.7 million) - Mother (Toho) WK4
¥124 million ($0.87 million), -06%, ¥1.320 billion ($9.4 million) - IDOLiSH7 Movie: LIVE 4bit - BEYOND THE PERiOD (Bandai Namco/Toei) WK6
¥92 million ($0.64 million), -57%, ¥411 million ($2.9 million) - The Flash (Warner Bros.) WK2
-----
¥79 million ($0.55 million), -28%, ¥13.112 billion ($97.1 million) - Detective Conan: The Black Iron Submarine (Toho) WK11


Detective Conan is out of the top 10 but included so we can track it vs Super Mario as the two are on track for similar totals in the coming months.

Has anyone predicted how much Miyazaki's 'How Do You Live' will gross? I worry that it won't do good business because he has opted out of marketing the film. They are apparently showing it in more cinemas than 'The Wind Rises', though.
For any Japanese Miyazaki fans here, is there much buzz in Japan for the film or are people a bit silent about it?
Cinemas don't even seem to be allowing advanced sales for the movie. Is this normal?
Are there any forums I can speak to Japanese people about how they feel about the movie?

Thanks

Hey! Welcome to the forum.

Yes, it is receiving more theaters than The Wind Rises, releasing in 386 standard theaters. (This is mostly due to there being a little more theaters now vs 2013.) This is pretty much the maximum standard theater count in the market before premium theaters come into play. I forget the exact count for The Wind Rises, but it should have been ~370. (And note! Theater count doesn't equal screen count!)

Honestly, it's very hard to predict with nothing but Miyazaki's name and the (vague) title* of the movie to go off of. No footage is going to be released, no plot info, no posters (besides the teaser that gives nothing), no cast revealed, etc. Nada.

*It's based on an old book, but Miyazaki has said it doesn't follow the story of the book, so.

It's going to be very interesting to see how going in blind will affect moviegoer attendance opening weekend (overall too, but especially opening weekend). Will the potential increase in interest to see what this movie even is benefit it? Or will moviegoers wait to hear what the film is about from friends and social media? But, given it is Miyazaki, we can probably set ¥10 billion as an initial goal. I'd be a little wary of expecting much more right now since The Wind Rises did ¥12.02 billion, and only got there thanks to a good bump it received during its run when Miyazaki announced he was retiring (which he always does, as you probably know). Doesn't mean How Do You Live? can't go higher, it could, there's just nothing to really support anything significantly more right now.

You can check the movie boards HERE for local discussions.

Even though there's no announcement on the composer yet but I'm pretty sure it'd be Joe Hisaishi.

Its him. Soundtrack has 37 songs incl. theme. Available from 9 August at Amazon. So far screenings rights have been sold to Korea and Russia.

Corpse, what do you think of Barbie? I've been thinking this probably wouldn't play well in Asia for a while but now that the film seems to be totally exploding at the domestic BO I'm wondering if that could put some wind in Japan.

I'm curious of its potential here myself.

Margot Robbie isn't really a known name in the market, I don't think. DC movies don't do very well and are probably seen by many of the same people. And none of the other films she's been in have done much in Japan. Similar situation for Ryan Gosling. He might be slightly more known (La La Land was a good sized hit), but none of his other films have really done much business in the market.

But the big questions are how well-known is the Barbie brand in the market, and if the film does big numbers in the US (let's say $200 million+ because less probably won't matter) can help generate buzz for it.

It's also worth mentioning that American (Western) comedies also rarely find success. I think its just a matter of culture. The jokes and such aren't offensive or anything, they're just hard to translate for Japanese audiences to understand.

So, I'm not expecting anything significant in Japan, but think it's at least worth keeping an eye on if it does big numbers in the US (and also receives glowing reviews too). If it gets, say, 80%+ on RT, and outgrosses a bunch of films like Transformers, Indiana Jones, and Oppenheimer, it could spur some interest.

I'm very interested in Oppenheimer's performance in Japan. It might seem like it'd be destined to bomb terribly (... sorry), but WWII films have a good track record in the market and Nolan is a recognizable director. Japan is old, and most know someone or lived through it themselves, so WWII movies usually have little trouble finding an audience who is interested in watching them. Oppenheimer is, of course, going to be a big test in this regard, so we'll see.

Hayao Miyazaki and Toshio Suzuki sent flowers to Masaki Suda (in February) and Kenshi Yonezu (yesterday), I'm wondering if it's a sign of their involvement in How do you live? Either as theme song artist or voice-actor. Even though both of them are singers but anime film usually use singer or actor as voice actor so...

In another news, Hayao Miyazaki is now nervous about no-promo plan
https://www.crunchyroll.com/news/latest ... anime-film

Is there also added interest because Japan is inextricably linked to nuclear war though the first two atom bombs being dropped on their country?

Oppenheimer is an interesting one for sure, it still doesn't even have a date I think.

Yeah, I suspect it'll get released in the Fall/Winter since the actual bombings were in August. Probably a bit insensitive to release it so close to the anniversary date.

And Algren (and anyone reading), note that I'm not some expert on this subject, so keep that in mind when reading the below:

I'd say... mostly yes? WW2 movies have a good enough track record at the box office to say there's an interest among the public (at least older people). Most only achieve modest success, but some have been able to reach blockbuster and even uber-blockbuster status (Miyazaki's The Wind Rises).

Most modern Japanese view WW2 as a dark era, and will say the government at the time wasn't faultless. (Not to justify having two atomic bombs dropped on them, obviously). And a lot of the focus, and teachings, is on the events that affected the public at the time instead of the war itself. There are, of course, very old nationalists who will disagree and/or sweep the events before WW2 under the rug, but as a whole, there's not much I guess "hate" over it. It's perceived as a dark event in history that's just that... history.

The Japanese are also reserved people, so it can be hard to get a clear picture of what they think in detail. Most are private, respectful people, will keep their opinions and thoughts to themselves as to not offend anyone. And they'll rarely get so involved with political leaders or parties that there becomes this sort of "good guys, bad guys" thing they get linked to. The Japanese public and Japanese government are largely separated. There's no (IMO stupid and irresponsible) obsession with politics or idolization of politicians. If there's a scandal involving a politician, the general public as a whole is going to view them unfavorably and not try to defend them.

Post-WW2 Japan saw huge economic growth too. This isn't to say the Japanese are somehow "thankful" of what happened, of course, but those benefits did leave an impact. If you look into articles or videos on the subject, you'll often hear many older Japanese say the years after the war were some of, if not the best the country has ever seen. The 1950s was also the Golden Age of the box-office. There are years where over 1 BILLION movie tickets were being sold. Tickets were cheap and people were doing well and had the money to spend.

The Japanese/America relationship has been very strong, one of the strongest relationships between nations in the world, and the majority of Japanese don't hate America or something. The events of the past are the events of the past and are seen as a time to learn and work toward peace instead.

Variety has an article up regarding Oppenheimer in Japan today. Just briefly going over how no release date has been set by Toho-Towa yet (not surprising, Hollywood films typically open late in Japan, and opening this one around the anniversary of the bombings probably isn't a good idea), and whether they'll be interest among moviegoers to watch it.

Maybe it's a coincidence... but I'm willing to bet someone there reads this thread/this forum. I've seen things said in articles at Variety (among other sites, like Crunchyroll) in the past that were taken almost directly from here before. There's nothing in the Variety article today that is close to copy/paste, but its timing is suspicious.