A Japanese Godzilla movie just out-opened a Hollywood one in North America, and it did it with subtitles. Godzilla Minus Zero debuted with roughly $63 million worldwide, and the records are piling up fast.
What's confirmed
Takashi Yamazaki's follow-up to Godzilla Minus One opened in Japan on November 3 (Godzilla Day) and took in ¥910 million, about $5.7 million, on its first day. That's reportedly the biggest opening day ever for a Japanese live-action film, per Gizmodo's reading of Deadline's numbers.
In North America it opened November 6 to about $31.6 million, according to The Week. That tops Hero's $17.8 million, which had held the opening-weekend record for a live-action foreign-language film for more than twenty years. Globally, the opening came to about $63 million, with IMAX supplying $21.3 million of it, around 34 percent.
Why the IMAX number matters
This is Japan's first project shot "filmed for IMAX," which means the cameras were certified for the format rather than the picture being enlarged afterward. A third of the opening coming from IMAX screens suggests audiences treated this as an event to see big, not a movie to catch at home. For a monster film about scale, that's the right instinct.
Minus One set the table
Godzilla Minus One opened to $11.4 million in North America in 2023 and finished near $116 million worldwide. Minus Zero nearly tripled that North American debut. Reports put the sequel's budget at roughly $18 to $19 million, still tiny next to a typical American creature feature, though that figure comes from one outlet.
Godzilla Minus One on 4K Blu-ray (Affiliate)
What we don't know yet
Opening weekends flatter sequels, and the real test is the second weekend and beyond. The Hunger Games prequel opens November 20, and the film hasn't yet reached India, where it's been pushed to November 20 to avoid clashing with Ramayana: Part 1 on IMAX screens. Legendary's Godzilla x Kong: Supernova is slated for March 2027, so we'll get a direct comparison of the two Godzilla traditions soon enough.