Box Office Notation

A series of notes regarding the Japanese box office, and the presentation on the site.

Conversion
The yen to dollar conversions for a film's total gross are done according to the exchange rate for the month the film was released. Converting the budget is done in the same manner in order to best compare the two figures. Conversions are always rounded because of the fluctuating exchange rate. Dollar figures are never converted back to a yen amount on any figures on the site.

Yen vs. the Dollar
The conversion rate between the Japanese yen and the American dollar can differ monumentally between a gap of only a year, or even a month sometimes. Because of this it's better to take note of the yen figures given for each film as opposed to the US dollar figures, as they are a more stable way of tracking how well a film is doing. For example: Godzilla, Mothra & King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001) would have earned around $20 million by the end of its theatrical run, but by 2004 that total would convert to around $25 million.

Rough Figure
This term, seen in parenthesis on the site, denotes when a yen or dollar figure has been rounded.

Distribution Earning
Prior to 1999, Japan often tracked box office performance through stating the distribution earnings. This figure is the money earned minus the revenue that would go to the theaters screening the film. For example, the distribution earnings on The Adventures of Chatran (1986) were ¥5,400,000,000 out of a total box office gross of ¥9,800,000,000. This means Toho took home ¥5,400,000,000 for distributing the film (although realistically, that piece of the pie is then divided up among the production companies) and the remainder accounts for what the theater playing the film made. Usually the distribution earnings are anywhere from 45%-70% of the total box office. These vary based on the agreements between the distribution companies and the various theaters. There are some exceptions, though. For example, the American movie ET had a distribution earning of 71.3% (¥9,620,000,000) out of the total box office revenue (¥13,500,000,000).

Country
The country in parentheses behind a figure, or date, correspond to which country that figure applies to. For example, Godzilla (1954) states the marketing budget as "¥37,106,545 / $600,000 (Japan)" and the Japan in parentheses denotes that this figure applies to the marketing of the Japanese theatrical release.