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The Boy and the Heron Film Returns to N. American Theaters on March 22
posted on by Alex Mateo
GKIDS announced on Thursday that Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki's latest feature film The Boy and the Heron (Kimi-tachi wa Dō Ikiru ka) is returning to North American theaters on March 22. The screenings will include an introduction from the film's composer Joe Hisaishi and a recorded drawing session with supervising animator and character designer Takeshi Honda. The film will screen in Japanese with English subtitles and with the English dub. The company streamed a trailer:
The film won Animation of the Year in the 47th annual Japan Academy Film Prizes and won the Best Motion Picture - Animated category at the 81st Golden Globes Awards earlier this year. The film also won awards from the Annie Awards (for storyboarding and character animation) and the British Academy Film Awards (for animated film). The Alliance of Women Film Journalists gave it the Best Animated Film award in its EDA Awards on December 31. The 78th Mainichi Film Awards announced ahead of its February 14 ceremony that the film would receive the Noburou Oofuji Award, which honors animated works that offer new forms of creative expression.
The film opened in Japan in July 2023, and sold 1.003 million tickets and earned about US$13.2 million in its first three days in Japan. The film sold 1.353 million tickets and earned 2.149 billion yen (about US$15.53 million) in its Friday-Monday long weekend (July 17 was the Marine Day holiday in Japan). It is the #71 highest-grossing film ever in Japan, and the third highest-grossing domestic film in Japan in 2023 with an 8.66 billion yen (about US$61.4 million) gross.
The film ranked at #1 in its opening weekend in the U.S. box office, with an earning of US$12,836,313 in its first three days. Variety reported that the film is the "first original anime production" to top the U.S. box office.
The film will stream exclusively on Max.
Source: Press release
