Excellent results from South Korea.

As for this weekend, in Japan, everything in the Top 10 either saw a single digit decrease or a double digit increase on Saturday. As I mentioned, last Saturday's business came to a standstill (New Year's Eve) after ~5PM or so, so it was a bit hard to predict how this Saturday was going to behave - clearly, very well.

I'm not going to get too excited about minimal decreases and potential increases across the board for the weekend just yet, though, because last Sunday was the 1st (major discount day), so this Sunday could be significantly down to counter the strong results from Saturday. We'll see.

If I had to make a prediction, I'd say Resident Evil: The Final Chapter will narrowly edge out a third-consecutive weekend victory thanks to its high avg. ticket price; however, Rogue One and Your Name. are still in contention depending on how Sunday performs.

Hopefully today we can know something about the admissions of the first blockbusters imported into Japan.

Meanwhile, I'm going ahead with things like this.

Most-Attended Imported Films released between 2010-2016
01. 20.03 million - Frozen (2014)
02. 10.10 million - Avatar (2009)
03. 7.45 million - Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)
04. 7.30 million - Alice in Wonderland (2010)
05. 7.22 million - Big Hero 6 (2014)
06. 7.20 million - Toy Story 3 (2010)
07. 7.05 million - Monsters University (2013)
08. 6.90 million - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2 (2011)
09. 6.26 million - Jurassic World (2015)
10. 5.90 million - Zootopia (2016) 
11. 5.86 million - Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011)
12. 5.58 million - Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 (2010) 
13. 5.56 million - Finding Dory (2016)
14. 4.98 million - Maleficent (2014)
15. 4.82 million - Les Miserables (2012)
16. 4.60 million - Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016) *
17. 4.46 million - Cinderella (2015)
18. 4.25 million - Minions (2015)
19. 4.24 million - Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011)

And it's now official, after sunday result, that Your Name has just passed the 1 miilion admission (1.176m).

It is now surging past staggering US$ 8.1 million.

Probably the 1st japan film to pass 1 Million during opening weekend only. Definitely best selling Japan material. I haven't really checked yet how much Howl and Spirites Away as the two top Japanese grosser in Souh Korea, but yn would simply passed those two, if not this weekend, definitely future weekend.

Very nice. I'm sure legs will be perfectly fine, likely excellent, so is a total of $40 million doable?

A worldwide total well north of $400 million is looking very good at this point.

~$250 million (or more) - Japan
~$83 million - China
~$40 million (projection) - South Korea
~$14 million (so far) - Other Released Markets

That's ~$387 million, not accounting for a lot of markets unreported/not updated or still to come.

Weekend Estimates will be posted shortly.

The weekend was very strong. Films primarily targeting children/teenagers (students) saw an incredible boost on Sunday to achieve weekend increases, with audiences taking full advantage of the last day before school fully begins to check them out. And, everything else in the Top 10 dropped less than 25%.

Thanks for the reply, tbh most of the asian films suffer the same fate outside their domestic region, a film that made over $500 m in China fade away within first hour itself in Japan

Highest grossing Japanese films in S.korea-
1. Your name $35 m + (expected)
2. Howl's moving castle $17.6 m
3. Spirited away $11.3 m
4. Ponyo $6.9 m
5. The secret world of arriety $ 6.8 m
6. Stand by Me doreamon $3.2 m
7. Yo Kai The watch $2.2 m
8. The boy and the beast $1.2 m
9. From Up on poppy hill $1.2 m
10. Tales from earth sea $1.1 m
(Not 100% accurate tho, might have missed some)

Heh, so Your Name. will effortlessly become the highest-grossing Japanese film in South Korea, then, perhaps doubling the record. I imagine there has to be a couple live-action films, Boys Over Flowers comes to mind, that made more than $1 million in South Korea.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Your Name. has now become the #1 Japanese film in every Asian market outside of Japan (at least, it will soon). And, of course, the holy grail of achievements will be dethroning Spirited Away in Japan itself. I doubt we'll have a firm prediction if that'll happen or not until next month, at the earliest, even after 20 weeks in release.

@corpse

Howl's:
1st weekend 3,995,214,551 KRW ($ 3,706,135) -- currency US$ 1 = 1078 KRW
8th weekend (accumulate) 18,014,064,390 KRW ($17,450,585) -- currency US$1 = 1032 KRW (last before out of top 10)

source: imdb, bom. multiplier= 4.5x

(checked Kobiz website, and found significant difference. There, Howl's accumulate to $12,650,339 in its 9th weekend, with just 1 screen left. It should be the final week of Howl's. Its opening there stated as $2,714,315. If Kobiz is the correct one, then multiplier= 4.66x).

Spirited Away:
1st weekend 2,567,351,032 KRW KRW ($$2,171,305) -- currency US$ 1 = 1182 KRW
5th weekend (accumulate) 13,469,231,741 KRW ($11,382,770) -- currency US$1 = 1183 KRW (last before out of top 10)

source: imdb, bom. multiplier= 5.25x

(can't found another source for 6th weekend or above. Kobiz didn't have data earlier than 2004).

If following the two trajectory, let's say it's quite safe to call a US$ 30 million cume (about 5.0x multiplier). From what i see, the distributors cut the screening really quick once it became slower. I don't know if this has got to do with government policy/ politic etc.

Well almost, i wonder
It's the highest all-time japan grosser for Taiwan, Mainland China, Thailand, and now, South Korea (prediction).

Yet, in HK it needs ~ $1.2 million to dethrone Stand by Me. I don't think this is achievable looking at current pace, except there's that Oscar surprise, which is a bit unlikely.

Your Name has also been released in Philippine, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, but very limited data could be collected so i can't tell anything. It's nice if someone could provide with some valid number.

Thanks for the details. So $30 million, at least, seems almost assured in South Korea. Let's hope for $35-40 million+, though!

Sorry I didn't had enough data on this, but as you said there has to be couple of live action films in the list and indeed, Your name triumph over every asian market it set foot in, it's getting released in vietnam also


Btw, how much can we expect from its initial run in USA?


Is KOBIZ rigged?

I found noticeable difference for other films as well

I'm uncertain of its potential when it's released in the U.S.. Anime films are handled quite poorly in the States, despite there being a large enough community that'd support wider, long-term releases.

FUNimation is distributing it, and while they've given it an Oscar qualifying run by releasing it in LA last November, so far there's no word on the nationwide release date this year (just "Coming Soon"). Sometime in the Spring is my guess, highly doubt they wait until Summer, so we have a couple months to ponder this question.

FUNimation has only recently began distributing films for theatrical release, since August 2015, and the majority of them have only been limited engagements (typically a week, unless a film does well, then they extend it by another week or two). Their latest release, One Piece Film Gold, will be screened from Jan. 10-17.

However, they shouldn't squander the potential that Your Name. may have in the States with such a release pattern that they've established in their short time as a distributor. I don't know if they'll have enough clout to earn the film an Oscar nomination (GKids has been successful with anime release in this regard, and they have a couple films eligible this year, too), but if they do manage to get the nomination, they should definitely push for a wide, longer-term, release.

Makoto Shinkai is a known name in the anime community, and most fans of anime or Japanese culture probably have interest in the film (likely have already seen it online, too). So... they have a base to rely on, the major worldwide success status (possibly over $400 million), the critical acclaim (97% RT; 81 MC), and they should handle it as such.

From what i read, US release is waiting for Your Name Oscar's nomination. Perhaps it is just as you said, they want to take advantage of such occasion to make a wide screen, long-duration screening, possible. I'm thinking, something on the opposite, in which more people need to see the film to push oscar nomination. Just random thought, though.

It's interesting that you brought the distributor's factor into this. In France, i didn't see Your Name again in the top 20 (prediction page) for this weekend.
http://www.cine-directors.net/boxbis.htm

I hope it's wrong, though. With such high audience rating (4.7/5.0) at allocine (in fact, the highest ever average rating given by audience there), it's a sign of how poor the distributor (Eurozoom) handle Your Name in France.

40M in Korea might be a stretch, there are two huge local movies opening next week, big screen loss will be unavoidable.

Let's hope for $30 million.

Weekend Actuals are being delayed a day again this week. Official numbers are always slow to come in during the start of January, so regular Monday updates will be back to normal next week.

I always post the top selling manga, video games and albums/singles each year around this time, so I'll work on those tonight. It's not directly box office related, but many films begin (a vast majority, actually) in print, or even as a game these days, and films do have albums/singles that chart well, too, so it's at least related.

I just checked and realize that Frozen did really really well there, too (besides in Japan)
With (just rough figure) $7.5 million opening, it then reach 10x multiplier to around $75 million. It's the highest grossing animation in South Korea.

Hopefully your name could reach 5-6 x multiplier so that the final figure is within 30-36 million. But, it's as you say, depend on the released films as well. As far as market demand, your name seems to be quite strong. Even some of Korea's Boyband members have good impression and recommend the film to their followers.

Rank for Japan 1-5 is already out (at doramainfo), in which a bit surprising
1. Yo Kai Watch
2. Resident Evil
3. your name.
4. Rogue One
5. Fantastic Beast

As Corpse has pointed out, Kono Sekai no Katasumi ni survive another week at the top 10.

Have to wait for official + numbers (Corpse).

edit:
Your Name is at Y 22.92 B until Sunday, this is higher Y 220 M than Corpse prediction. With yesterday's result, in which every film still enjoy high amount admission (today everything is back to normal though), would result a number passing Y 23.0 B total. Insane new year boost. I wonder what would happen on January 24th (Academy Award nominations result is out) and if your name. actually manage to be included on the short list.

Not to mention the Imax showings is still on going at that time.

Anime is an medium which is often overlooked by majority and that too for a good reason, but once in a while the saviour of anime comes and change the whole outlook, previously in form of Ghibli and now Shinkai, so with the huge number of fans and hype sorrunding it, I'm still expecting a wide release in US, but I've to agree with both of you regarding distributor factor.

http://www.boxofficemojo.com/studio/cha ... mation.htm

The most successful film them till now is DBZ:RF with collection of $8 M from over 900 theaters, going by that Funimation should pull at least 2X more screens for Your name.


$40 M is still on card, while other films dropped significantly, Your name is still holding well with around $1 M on both Monday and Tuesday respectively.

-Oscar buzz-
The animated film (Your name) which win at LAFCA never fails to get an academy nomination, while the animated film (Zootopia) which makes into AFI's Top 10 is bound to be oscar winner and it's already won at Golden globe.
Another foreign contender "My life as a courgette" is in the list as well, it already made into shortlist of nine films for best foreign film and will probably get an nomination as well, if it manage to get itself into animation category also, then surely it's an extraordinary feat for a film with merely $4 M BO collection.
There are 24 more, what an year it was for animation

What you guys think?

@kireilanford: Japanese weekend/weekly rankings are in terms of admissions. Yo-Kai Watch 3, quite impressively, managed to rise to the #1 spot in its fourth weekend this past weekend in terms of ticket sales (so it'll continue the series' streak of #1 weekend rankings); however, it actually only ranked 4th in terms of revenue due to its very low avg. ticket price. Resident Evil repeated for a third-consecutive week at #1 in revenue.

I'll have the Weekend Actuals posted in an hour or two.

『バイオハザード：ザ・ファイナル』

Weekend Actuals (01/07-08)
01 (01) ¥286,026,500 ($2.5 million), -06%, ¥3,201,701,700 ($27.7 million), Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (Sony) WK3
02 (02) ¥254,055,500 ($2.2 million), -16%, ¥3,731,764,700 ($32.3 million), Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Disney) WK4
03 (03) ¥242,619,600 ($2.1 million), +05%, ¥22,795,758,100 ($217.2 million), Your Name. (Toho) WK20
04 (05) ¥225,435,900 ($1.9 million), +39%, ¥2,695,173,700 ($23.3 million), Yo-Kai Watch: The Movie 3 (Toho) WK4
05 (04) ¥168,132,400 ($1.4 million), -09%, ¥6,760,004,300 ($59.9 million), Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Warner Bros.) WK7
06 (06) ¥120,368,500 ($1.0 million), +20%, ¥1,852,122,900 ($15.9 million), A Man Called Pirate (Toho) WK5
07 (07) ¥103,569,500 ($889,000), +24%, ¥1,031,307,000 ($9.2 million), The Mole Song 2: Hong Kong Crazy Uproar Song (Toho) WK3
08 (08) ¥95,690,900 ($825,000), +49%, ¥1,325,276,900 ($11.4 million), Tomorrow, I Will Date With Yesterday's You (Toho) WK5
09 (---) ¥86,718,100 ($747,000), 0, ¥86,718,100 ($747,000), Kizumonogatari Part 3: Reiketsu (Toho Video Division) NEW
10 (09) ¥77,425,110 ($668,000), +106%, ¥1,123,568,610 ($9.8 million), In This Corner of the World (Tokyo Theaters, Co.) WK9

>Resident Evil: The Final Chapter achieves its third-consecutive week atop the box office, and thanks to an impressive New Years boost, it's now tracking 1% ahead of Afterlife (the highest-grossing film in the series) and 14% ahead of Retribution (the second highest-grossing film in the series).

The sixth, and final installment in the Resident Evil franchise will certainly outgross Retribution's ¥3.8 billion total now, and will exceed ¥4 billion ($35 million+) as well. I don't believe it'll be able to stay ahead of Afterlife and overtake it as the highest-grossing film in the series (it'll need to gross over ¥4.7 billion), but it could wind up within just ¥500 million or so from the record.

>Rogue One had to settle for second place once again, and continue to trail The Force Awakens by over 50% (53%). As far as a successful spin-off goes, one could consider it as such in a market that often look the other way at spin-off attempts, but overall... it's certainly a bit underwhelming, especially considering how well Fantastic Beasts, another spin-off, has performed in the market.

As of this weekend, it's on track to reach at least ¥4.5 billion ($40 million), but it'll really want to reach that ¥5 billion ($45 million) blockbuster milestone.

>Your Name. managed its third-consecutive weekend increase and came pretty close to recaputing the #1 spot in its 20th weekend of release. And while it wasn't able to climb back to the top, yet, it did break Spirited Away's 20th weekend record by a significant 56%.

After 20 weeks, Makoto Shinkai's mega-phenomenon has sold a mammoth 17,685,352 admissions. It's just a matter of time now for it to surpass Frozen and Titanic (already beat the latter's admissions), beginning its journey of breaking the only two records it'll have left to break: dethroning Spirited Away from atop the highest-grossing films and most-attended films charts.

>Yo-Kai Watch 3 enjoyed a very generous New Years boost, much more than its two predecessors enjoyed (in terms of percentage), and actually ranked #1 over the weekend in terms of admissions. The Yo-Kai Watch franchise has declined at the box office much faster than Toho and Level 5 likely wanted it to; however, the legs for each film has begun to improve so it should begin to stabilize in the next couple years.

If they can bring in ~¥3 billion every December, comparable to the annual franchises (e.g., Doraemon), they'll be set for many, many years to come.

>Fantastic Beasts is now less than ¥100 million away from outgrossing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1 - the lowest grossing film in the Harry Potter franchise, which it'll do sometime this week. It's very rare for a spin-off of any variety to match the success of the main series (Rogue One is a current example), so Beasts' success is quite significant.