Can Miyazaki’s ‘The Boy And The Heron’ Take The Top Spot At The U.S. Box Office This Weekend?
Hayao Miyazaki’s latest film, The Boy and the Heron, will finally hit U.S. theaters this week, five months after it enjoyed a massive debut in Japan.
The hype around the Studio Ghibli film is incredible and critics are in love, but how will that translate at the box office? Could Miyazaki score the top spot at U.S. theaters for the first time in his career?
Several factors are working in The Boy and the Heron’s favor. For one, it will get the widest U.S. release for any Studio Ghibli film ever, and by a significant margin. Originally, the film was scheduled to screen in 1,800 theaters, but according to Exhibitor Relations Co., that has recently increased to 2,200+ theaters.
The number is comparable to Crunchyroll’s release of Makoto Shinkai’s Suzume, which opened in 2,170 theaters back in April. According to Box Office Pro, The Boy and the Heron is currently tracking 135% ahead of Suzume’s Thursday presales.
Suzume ended up grossing $5 million over its opening weekend. A similar result for The Boy and the Heron would be a major disappointment, especially given the disparity in competition the two films will have faced. Suzume debuted against The Super Mario Bros. Movie’s second weekend, in which the video game adaptation made $92.3 million, pulling away many viewers from Shinkai’s film.
Conversely, there will be very little competition for The Boy and the Heron this coming weekend. There are no major studio releases scheduled, and many box office tracking websites, just about all of them really, are saying this could be one of the slowest weekends of the year.
Currently, most of those sites are predicting an opening weekend of between $7-10 million for The Boy and the Heron. If the film reaches the top end of those predictions, it would need Renaissance: A Film by Beyoncé to drop more than 50% in its second week to take the top spot. The concert film opened with $21.8 million last weekend.
Holdovers that could take away some of Heron’s audience include The Hunger Games: The Balland of Songbirds and Snakes, which made $14.2 million last weekend, and Godzilla Minus One, which made $11.4 million. Both films look likely to drop below The Boy and the Heron in the coming frame.
Whatever happens, The Boy and the Heron is an absolute lock to score the biggest U.S. opening of any Miyazaki film. The director’s films, and Ghibli films in general, have typically received very limited theatrical releases, most from Disney. For example, Spirited Away only screened in 26 theaters when it opened in the U.S., grossing just $449,839. The film was put into more theaters after winning the animated feature Oscar in 2003, but still nothing close to what The Boy and the Heron will get. The Wind Rises debuted in 21 theaters, Howl’s Moving Castle in 36.
Miyazaki’s widest and highest-grossing release is currently Ponyo, which played in 927 theaters in 2009, grossing $3.6 million over its first weekend. The biggest release for a Ghibli film belongs to The Secret World of Arrietty, which opened in 1,522 theaters in February 2012, making $6.4 million over its opening frame.
