May 1, 2023

The Super Mario Bros. Movie" Surpasses $1 Billion at the Worldwide Box Office

Illumination's "Super Mario Brothers Movie," directed by Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenick, surpassed the $1 billion mark in its fourth weekend of release. It is the first animated film to achieve this feat prior to the pandemic.

The theatrical release of the film, distributed by Universal Pictures, has gone down in history. Some of these include:

Domestic

Worldwide

Domestically, it grossed an estimated $40 million and grossed $490 million.

Internationally, the illuminated epic earned $68.3 million, supported by releases in the key markets of South Korea and Japan. In South Korea, it had the second-largest opening of the year, earning $4.67 million ($5.76 million in the opening five days). In Japan, however, Mario grossed $14.3 million at the box office, making it the biggest studio animated film ever and Universal's best ever.

With the updated weekend box office, the worldwide box office for The Super Mario Brothers Movie reached $1.02 billion.

Next weekend, the film will finally lose its top spot to Marvel's "Guardians of the Galaxy." Nevertheless, there will still be little competition in the kids/family arena in May and June, when Disney releases Pixar's "Elemental" and Universal launches its new DreamWorks franchise "Ruby Gillman: Teenage Kraken."

The First Slam Dunk continues to do well, especially in China. The film grossed an additional $12.9 million, good for seventh place worldwide, despite being released in only six markets. Toei Animation's adaptation of the popular basketball manga by Takehiko Inoue grossed $232.9 million worldwide.

"Suzume" earned an additional $535,000 in its third weekend of release in the U.S., and has now grossed $9.8 million domestically. This is well ahead of the previous films by the original creator, Makoto Shinkai, "Weather With You" ($8.1 million) and "Your Name" ($5 million), indicating a growing demand for anime outside of the larger franchises among American audiences.