News
Demon Slayer Film Tops 2 U.S. Streaming Charts
posted on by Alex Mateo
The entertainment news source IndieWire reported on Tuesday that the Demon Slayer – Kimetsu no Yaiba – The Movie: Mugen Train anime has ranked #1 on the Google Play and Vudu streaming platforms in the United States. In addition, the film ranked at #5 on FandangoNOW and #7 on Apple TV/iTunes.
Apple TV/iTunes and Google Play rank films daily by number of transactions, as opposed to total revenue.
Universal's Nobody film was the top ranked movie on Apple TV/iTunes and FandangoNOW, and the #2 ranked film on Google Play and Vudu under Demon Slayer.
Funimation and Aniplex of America released the film digitally on June 22.
Mugen Train began screening in Japan on October 16. After 12 consecutive weeks at #1 in the box office in Japan, it dropped to #2 during the January 9-10 weekend, its 13th weekend. The film had ranked in the top three spots weekly in Japan since then, until its 22nd weekend.
The film sold a total of 28,966,806 tickets for 40,016,942,050 yen (about US$367.6 million) in Japan as of May 23 — and became the first film ever to pass the 40 billion yen milestone. It has since earned 40,096,913,600 yen (about US$366.53 million) in Japan as of June 6. It is still playing in some Japanese theaters.
In 45 countries and territories worldwide, Mugen Train sold a total of 41.35 million tickets to earn the equivalent of 51.7 billion yen (about US$475 million) as of May 23. The film was the highest-earning film worldwide from 2020. It is the first non-Hollywood or non-American film to top the yearly box office worldwide since the beginning of cinema over a century ago.
The film is now the #2 highest-earning anime film ever at the U.S. box office.
Mugen Train has surpassed Hayao Miyazaki's 2002 Spirited Away, its last rival for all-time highest earnings in Japanese box office history. The film has also surpassed Spirited Away as the #1 highest-earning Japanese film of all time worldwide.
The film had the highest opening weekend globally for the October 16-18 weekend. The film sold 3,424,930 tickets and earned 4,623,117,450 yen (about US$43.85 million) in Japan in its first three days. The film sold 910,507 tickets and earned over 1,268,724,700 yen (about US$12.03 million) on its opening day alone, making it the highest weekday opening day in Japan ever.
The anime ranked #1 and #2 (for the regular and limited edition releases) on both Oricon's Blu-ray Disc and DVD weekly ranking charts when it debuted during the June 16-20 week. The film's regular editions set new records for animated titles since Japan began its current Reiwa era two years ago. The anime film had sold 1,074,170 copies total of its Blu-ray Disc and DVD releases in Japan (including both the limited and regular editions) in only three days since it debuted on June 16.
The main staff members of the previous television anime returned for the sequel film. TOHO and Aniplex are handling the film's distribution in Japan.
Source: IndieWire (Tom Brueggemann)
