News

Evangelion: 3.0 Led to 1-Day Records at Tokyo's Wald 9 Theater

The Saturday opening of Evangelion: 3.0 You Can (Not) Redo (Evangelion Shin Gekijō-ban Q) led to Tokyo's Shinjuku Wald 9 cinema complex setting new one-day attendance and box-office revenue records. On Saturday, 15,290 bought tickets for different films at the complex for 25,675,800 yen (about US$316,000) in box-office revenue.

Evangelion: 3.0 alone sold 10,671 tickets for 18,523,400 yen (US$228,000) on Saturday. In addition to Evangelion: 3.0, the complex also screened Ninkyō Helper, Lesson of the Evil, Kita no Canaria-tachi, and other films that day.

Evangelion: 3.0 ran on all nine of the complex's screens at midnight on Saturday, and the 17 overnight screenings sold 4,087 tickets for 7,115,900 yen (US$87,600). The tickets for the overnight showings had sold out within five minutes of going on sale.

The Shinjuku Wald 9 complex opened in February of 2007 with a total of 1,842 seats. The complex's previous one-day record was set on July 18, 2010, the day that Hiromasa Yonebayashi and Studio Ghibli's The Secret World of Arrietty film opened in Japan. Toy Story 3 and Bayside Shakedown the Movie 3 also played on that day during Japan's summer vacation, and the complex earned 18,762,000 yen (US$231,000) from 11,242 tickets.

The third film in Hideaki Anno and Khara's four-part remake of Gainax's Neon Genesis Evangelion anime series opened in 223 theaters across Japan on Saturday. Wald 9 is also screening, for the first time in a theater, Evangelion: 1.11 You Are (Not) Alone and Evangelion: 2.22 You Can (Not) Advance (the latest versions of these two previous films) for a limited time.

Source: animeanime.biz