Animated features remain the top story at this year’s theatrical box office. This past weekend, the top two films, not only in the United States but across the entire globe, were both animated. In the U.S., 70% of all box office dollars went to animation.
Illumination’s Despicable Me 4, directed by Chris Renaud and co-directed by Patrick Delage, launched with an estimated $122.6 million domestic over the extended five-day Independence Day holiday weekend, with $75m of that over the standard Fri-Sun period. The most recent comp for the film is the spinoff Minions: The Rise of Gru, which opened almost identically ($123m) over the July 4th holiday in 2022. The key difference though is that Minions achieved its gross over four days, while DM4 had a five-day opening window.
Notably, DM4’s gross in the U.S. is being driven by Latino and Hispanic moviegoers, the same demographic that propelled Inside Out 2 to eye-popping numbers. For DM4, 41% of the domestic audience was Latino/Hispanic, compared to 27% Caucasian, 12% Black, 11% Asian, and 9% Native American/other. Compare this to Rise of Gru just two years ago: 35% Caucasian, 35% Latino/Hispanic, 12% Black, and 18% Asian/Native American/other.
DM4 pulled an additional $73m from 73 territories abroad, and its global total now stands at $229.5m. The film has yet to open in many key locations including France, China, U.K., Germany, and South Korea. In Brazil, DM4 launched with $5.9m, biggest ever for the franchise, and in United Arab Emirates the film opened with $2m, making it the country’s biggest animation launch of all time. It opened at no. 1 across much of the world including Spain, Central America, Malaysia, Norway, Denmark, Poland, Vietnam, Taiwan, Turkey, and Philippines, among other territories.
Meanwhile, Pixar’s Inside Out 2 is on its way to becoming the highest-grossing Pixar title of all time, an achievement it’ll notch in a few days when it surpasses Incredibles 2.
Domestically, IO2 notched $30m in its fourth weekend, for an eye-popping $533.8 total. Abroad, the film’s gross actually exceeded DM4 with $78.3m from 45 territories. Overall, it added $108.3m to its running total of $1.21 billion.
The big story here we’re following is its performance across Latin America, where it has become the region’s second-biggest film of all time (Avengers: Endgame remains no. 1 for now). In Mexico, IO2 has become the biggest film of all time with $90.2m, surpassing the previous record-holder Spider-Man: No Way Home. It is also the top-grossing film of all time in Colombia, Chile, and Uruguay.
