Shinkai Makoto’s Suzume Ends Impressive Run in Japan

“Suzume” has been another major hit for popular anime director Shinkai Makoto. See where it stacks up in both Japan and the world at large.

By Noah Oskow

On May 27th, Shinkai Makoto’s hit new anime film, Suzume no Tojimari (すずめの戸締まり, called simply Suzume in English-language markets) ended its impressive run at the box office in its home country of Japan. The movie, which released on November 11th, 2022, was in theaters for an extended 198 days; even in its last weekend in theaters, it managed to gain 8th place at the box office. In all, Suzume has brought in ¥14.79 billion in Japan — equivalent to around $105.4 million USD. [1]

This puts Suzume snuggly in the top box office rankings in Japanese history, coming in at 14th. This means Suzume out-grossed Shinkai’s second-most-recent film, 2019’s Weathering with You, which raked in ¥14.23 billion. Sitting directly above Suzume at 13th is Miyazaki Hayao’s beloved 2008 anime film Ponyo.

While ¥14.79 billion is a strong showing, it still pales in comparison to Shinkai’s 2016 mega-hit Your Name (君の名は). That film made a massive ¥25.17 billion, and was the first-ever anime film not by Studio Ghibli’s Miyazaki to make over ¥10 billion in Japan…