Godzilla Minus Zero tops North American box office, breaks 2002 record

Japanese action film 'Godzilla Minus Zero' has taken the top spot at the North American box office, earning 31.6 million US dollars. Shown in 3,254 theatres, the film has set a new all-time record for the opening earnings of a foreign-language live-action film in the North American market.

With this, the long-standing record of 17.8 million dollars set by the Chinese film 'Hero' in 2002 has been broken.

The film, a sequel to the 2023 Oscar-winning 'Godzilla Minus One', is directed by Takashi Yamazaki and produced by Japan's Toho.

Along with a 90 per cent positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes and an 'A' grade on CinemaScore, premium large format (PLF) played a major role behind the film's earnings. As the first Japanese film shot in the IMAX format, about 40 per cent of its total earnings — 12.7 million dollars — came from IMAX screens alone.

On the other hand, Warner Bros.' animated film 'The Cat in the Hat', based on Dr. Seuss's popular children's book, suffered a major blow at the box office. Released in 4,003 theatres, the film managed to earn only 20 million dollars.

Made at a cost of 92 million dollars, the film added another 10 million dollars from 60 international markets, taking its worldwide opening earnings to 30.5 million dollars. Although audiences gave it an 'A' grade on CinemaScore, only 45 per cent of critics gave it a positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The film features the voice of Bill Hader.

After several recent failures such as 'Digger', 'The Bride!' and 'Supergirl', this is another major setback for Warner Bros. However, analysts believe family animated films generally manage to recover their main costs later through digital streaming and television broadcast rights.

Among other notable films at the weekly box office, Nitesh Tiwari's Indian epic 'Ramayana: Rise of a Legend', distributed by Sony Pictures, was released in 1,300 theatres in North America and earned 8.6 million dollars in the traditional three days and 12.1 million dollars in four days in total, taking fifth place on the chart. This is the widest release ever for an Indian film in the North American market.

The mega project, made in two parts at a cost of 500 million dollars, collected 55.7 million dollars worldwide in its first week, including 3.2 million dollars from India and 3 million dollars from the United Kingdom.

In addition, A24's much-discussed documentary 'You Can See Everything' on Elizabeth Holmes, made on a budget of only 7 million dollars, added 8.8 million dollars in its fourth week, taking its total domestic earnings to nearly 79.8 million dollars and holding on to fourth place.

Christian musical 'Drummer Boy' stood third with 9.3 million dollars, Martin McDonagh's dark comedy 'Wild Horse Nine' stood eighth with 6 million dollars, and the limited-release 'Club Kid' and 'I Play Rocky' maintained commendable per-screen averages.

Overall, total box office earnings of all films in the North American market last weekend stood at 114 million dollars, 86 per cent more than the same period last year. According to Rentrak data, total ticket sales so far this year have reached 8.6 billion dollars.