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Japan’s animation industry generated $22bn (¥3.3tn) in 2023, the highest number on record and a 14% increase on 2022, according to the Association of Japanese Animations (Aja).

The industry group, which has been releasing annual anime industry reports since 2009, revealed the results of its latest survey at the Tiffcom market in Tokyo today (October 31).

Aja’s findings also revealed that overseas anime revenues surpassed those of the domestic market in 2023, with overseas revenues making up 51.5%, or $11.25bn(¥1.72tn), and domestic 49.5%, or $10.6 billion (¥1.62 trillion). It marks the second time overseas topped domestic, the first being in 2020. With anime’s popularity continuing to expand...

Local animated features led Japanese box office in the first half of 2024 as just two Hollywood titles broke the top 10.

Of the 20 highest-grossing films released so far this year, 15 were produced in Japan. Six out of the top 10 titles are anime features.

Dominating the first half of 2024 was Detective Conan: The Million-Dollar Pentagram, the 27th annual entry in a series of films about a high school detective who has been shrunk to child-like proportions. The film has earned $94.4m (¥15.19bn) – a record for the long-running franchise. By comparison, 2023’s top-grossing film, animation The First Slam Dunk, took $98.6m (¥15.87bn) over...

Detective Conan: The Million-Dollar Pentagram has become the biggest film in the long-running Japanese anime franchise with takings of $89.6m (¥14.1bn), cementing its position as the most successful Japanese film of 2024 to date.

The 27th instalment of the popular Detective Conan series reached 9.77 million admissions as of May 27 and now ranks as the 12th highest-grossing Japanese film of all time at the local box office. It has topped the box office for six consecutive weekends in Japan.

The Million-Dollar Pentagram is the latest story set in the world of Conan Edogawa, the child-sized detective created by manga author Gosho Aoyama in 1994. The films,...

The 27th feature film of Detective Conan anime series, titled Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Pentagram, has set a new box office record. The film has amassed a remarkable 9.77 million viewers and grossed 14.01 billion yen in just 45 days.

The film has thereby surpassed the record held by the 26th feature film, titled Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine (2023), which earned 13.88 billion yen.

This feat makes Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Pentagram the highest-grossing film in the franchise history.

Here is a breakdown of the film’s box office performance:

Opening Day: 630,000 admissions, 960 million yen First 3 Days: 2,274,333 admissions, 3,352,494,500 yen 10 Days: 6.5 billion yen 22 Days: 7,320,000 admissions, 10.5 billion yen 25 Days: 8,453,000 admissions, 12.099 billion yen 31 Days: 8,980,000 admissions, 12.8 billion yen 38 Days: 9,430,000 admissions, 13.5 billion yen 45 Days: 9,770,000 admissions, 14.01 billion yen

Detective Conan: The Million-Dollar Pentagram hit the Japanese theatres on April 12, 2024.

The film had achieved the second highest opening weekend collection for an anime movie, overtaking the opening week gross...

Case Closed: The Million-dollar Pentagram , the 27th feature film in the Case Closed/Detective Conan anime franchise, continued to stay at the top the Japanese box office now for the sixth consecutive weekend. The record for the longest stay in first place in the Case Closed/Detective Conan film series is seven weekends — from April to May 2018 — held by Detective Conan Zero the Enforcer , the 22nd film in the series. The Million-dollar Pentagram earned 408 million yen (2.61 million Usd) on 278,000 admissions in its sixth weekend of May 17-19, a 24.6 percent week-by-week drop, according to Kogyo Tsushinsha. Since debuting in Japanese theaters on April 12, the movie has earned a box office total of 13.5 billion yen (86.32 million Usd) from 9.43 million ticket sales. The movie also became the second top-grossing film in the Conan anime franchise, behind only the 2023 film Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine with 13.88 billion yen (88.75 million Usd). It also now ranks...

Written by Gosho Aoyama, the Detective Conan manga (also known as Case Closed) is one of the longest franchises in history. The series has been ongoing since 1994 and while Aoyama has teased the ending on more than one occasion, it is not even in sight. The anime series is also one of the longest-running ones in history. Currently, there are 32 seasons and more than 1,100 episodes, which is amazing. Of course, numerous other works have been produced, including almost 30 feature anime films, the most recent of which, Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Pentagram, premiered on April 12, 2024 in Japan and is extremely successful!

Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Pentagram is the 27th feature anime film that is part of the Detective Conan series, and we are happy to report that it is currently the hottest anime film in Japan, earning more than 9 billion yen as of the time of writing!

The news is coming directly from Japan,...

After years of being on the cusp of going completely mainstream, the latest anime film in the Detective Conan/Case Closed franchise, The Million-Dollar Pentagram , has finally put all the pieces together and in just 18 days has made over 9 billion yen at the Japanese box office. Not only that, the latest film has pushed the entire movie series past 100 million tickets sold, making it the third franchise in Japan to do so. As of Monday, April 29, Detective Conan: The Million-Dollar Pentagram has brought in 9.29 billion yen (US$59.51 million) on the back of 6.44 million tickets sold. This makes it the 61st highest-grossing film in Japan of all time and the 19th highest-grossing anime film in Japan ever, passing Studio Ghibli’s Arrietty . The Million-Dollar Pentagram is currently outpacing Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine ’s box office gross by a wide margin, likely to overtake the highest-grossing film in the franchise at 13.73 billion yen very soon.

Anime and manga fans will know that Detective Conan (also known as Case Closed) is one of of the longest franchises in history. Written by Gosho Aoyama, the manga has been ongoing continuously since 1994, and while Aoyama has teased the ending on more than one occasion, it is not even in sight. The anime series currently has 32 seasons and more than 1,100 episodes, which is amazing. Detective Conan is quite popular around the world and alongside the anime and the manga, numerous movies have been produced as well. The 27th movie in total, Detective Conan: The Million Dollar Pentagram, is premiering on April 12, 2024 in Japan, and a final pre-release trailer has just been released.

The upcoming movie follows the Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine movie, which was released on April 14, 2023, almost exactly a year before the upcoming movie. The movie will see Conan and his friends tackle another mystery involving the famous thief,...

The award ceremony for the 47th Japan Academy Film Prizes was held at the Grand Prince Hotel New Takanawa in Tokyo on March 8. The Boy and the Heron , Hayao Miyazaki's first feature film in ten years, won the Best Animation of the Year award. Related: The 47th Japan Academy Film Prize Announces Excellent Animation of the Year Winners Films eligible for the prize included those released in Japan between January 1 and December 31, 2023. The Boy and the Heron was selected from the five Japanese anime films that received the Excellent Animation of the Year award . The other four films included — Kitaro Tanjou: GeGeGe no Nazo (Go Koga), Totto-Chan: The Little Girl at the Window (Shinnosuke Yakuwa), Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine (Yuzuru Tachikawa), and Blue Giant (Yuzuru Tachikawa). Blue Giant , an anime film adaptation of Shinichi Ishizuka's jazz-themed manga of the same name, won the Outstanding Achievement in Music award.

The first of the two Haikyu!! Final anime film’s keeps winning as the movie held strong over the long weekend coming in first place again and dominating the box office, by being the 4th film ever in Japan to pass 4 billion yen in the same time frame. This puts the film on pace to reach at least 10 billion yen by the end of its run with 15 billion yen also being in play. As of February 25, the first Haikyu!! Final anime film has brought in 4.18 billion yen (US$27.83 million) with 2.9 million tickets sold in the film’s first 10 days. This tracks the film higher than Suzume in 2022 at 4.154 billion yen, higher than The First Slam Dunk later that year at 3 billion yen and shy of Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine ’s 5.86 billion yen in April 2023 . It will be interesting to see how the first Haikyu!! Final anime film keeps pace...

Japan’s cinema box office edged slightly forward in 2023 after a strong rebound in 2022, but the business remains at levels below record-breaking 2019, which was the last normal year before the Covid pandemic.

Annual figures were released on Tuesday by the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan (Eiren), with the ‘2023’ data idiosyncratically covering the period from the beginning of December 2022 to the end of November.

Ticket sales grew by 2% from 152 million in 2022 to 155 million in 2023. Gross box office in local currency climbed by 4% from JPY213 billion to JPY221 billion. With the Japanese Yen languishing at multi-year lows that was equivalent to $1.5 billion in dollar terms.

The 2023 admissions figure is 20% below 2019’s 195 million. The 2023 gross box office total is 15% below 2019’s JPY261 trillion, which was also a time when the Japanese currency was worth vastly more against the American dollar.

The number of imported and local films arriving in Japanese cinemas was...

The Japanese box office rose 3.9% to $1.5bn (¥221.5bn) in 2023, led by local anime features, Hollywood blockbusters and monster film Godzilla Minus One.

Cinema admissions were up 2.3% to 155.5 million, according to data published Tuesday by the Motion Picture Producers Association of Japan (Eiren). The figures are the biggest since pre-pandemic 2019, when the gross box office was $1.64bn (¥242bn) from 195 million admissions.

The country remains the world’s third largest box office territory behind North America and China.

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Some 556 imported films accounted for a 33% market share in 2023, slightly up on last year’s 31%, and took $497m...

’Wonka’ topped the box office in 60 of its 77 international markets

Worldwide box office December 15-17 RankFilm (distributor)3-day (world) Cume (world)3-day (int’l) Cume (int’l) Territories 1. Wonka (Warner Bros) $92.6m $151.4m $53.6m $112.4m 78 2. Endless Journey (various) $20.5m $34.6m $20.5m $34.6m 1 3. Wish (Disney) $15.4m $126.2m $12.2m $71.9m 40 4. The Hunger Games: The Ballad Of Songbirds & Snakes (Lionsgate) $12.3 $300.5m $6.5m $155.3m 85 5. Wolf Hiding (various) $11.2m $12.2m $11.2m $12.2m 1 6. 12:12 The Day (Seoul Spring) (various) $10.6m $62.7m $10.6m $62.7m 5 7. Detective Conan: Black Iron Submarine (various) $10.3m $129.1m $10.3m $129.1m 3 8. Napoleon (Sony) $10.3m $188.4m $8m $131.4m 66 9. The Boy And The Heron (GKids...

Chinese-made crime drama, “Endless Journey” opened on top of the mainland China box office on a weekend with three new releases in the top five.

The Wanda Pictures and Alibaba title earned $20.5 million (RMB146 million) between Friday and Sunday, its official opening weekend, according to data from consultancy Artisan Gateway. Together with previews from the week earlier, it ended the weekend with a cumulative total of $34.5 million (RMB245 million).

Despite being released only in one territory, “Endless Journey” was the world’s second highest performing film over the weekend, according to calculations by another box office tracking firm ComScore. “Wonka,” which has already fallen out of the top ranks in China, was the global number one with an estimated $53.6 million in international territories and a $39 million debut weekend in North America.

Adapted from a book “Please Tell the Director, the Mission of the Third Brigade Has Been Completed” by Shenlan,...

Political drama thriller “12.12: The Day” dominated the South Korean box office for a second weekend with a $13 million haul.

Its second weekend outing topped its first session, when it earned $11.2 million, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). And the film (aka “Seoul Spring”) increased its share of the weekend’s total cinema market to a crushing 81%.

Separately, ComScore calculated that the film’s single country receipts made it the seventh highest grossing film in the world over the weekend.

After two weekends on release, “12.12: The Day” has garnered $34.2 million, making it already the sixth ranking film in Korea this year and the third biggest Korean-produced picture. On this track, it will overtake “Smugglers” before the next weekend.

In terms of admissions, “12.12: The Day” enjoyed 1.7 million ticket sales over the weekend, for a running total of 4.66 million. The traditional...

Lee Byung-hun-starring disaster movie “Concrete Utopia” topped the South Korean box office over the latest weekend, replacing female led crime caper “Smugglers.”

Directed by Um Tae-hwa, “Concrete Utopia” is set in a Seoul that has been largely destroyed by a massive earthquake. One building stands tall among the wreckage and becomes a refuge for those already inside, but the inhabitants must fend of the unwanted attentions of outsiders.

It opened on Wednesday, earning $8.40 million between Friday and Sunday and fully $11.3 million over its full opening five days, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic). The data showed it has an impressive 53% market share.

“Smugglers” continued to perform strongly. While it slipped from first to second place in its third week, over the weekend it added $3.19 million. That lifted its 19-day cumulative total to $31.5 million. Local media report that it has passed...

Ryu Seung-wan’s female-led crime caper “Smugglers” topped the South Korean box office for a second weekend, ahead of new release title “Ransomed.”

“Smugglers” enjoyed a strong hold in its second weekend of release and commanded 42% market share. It delivered $7.09 million, a drop of only 20% on its opening weekend, giving a 12-day cumulative of $26.2 million, according to data from Kobis, the tracking service operated by the Korean Film Council (Kofic).

“Ransomed,” a 1980s-set drama thriller set in Lebanon, follows the travails of a low-ranking Korean diplomat who performs heroics in an attempt to rescue a kidnapped official. The film opened in second place with $3.34 million over the weekend and $5.19 million over its full five-day opening run.

“Elemental,” the Pixar cartoon that has charmed Korea, continued in a strong third place. It earned $2.26 million over the weekend, for a cumulative of $47.5 million. That total means that it has overtaken Japanese animated...