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"Minions" madness descends on China, setting opening day box office record

Xinhua, September 15, 2015 Adjust font size:

"Minions" grossed 123 million yuan (19.5 million U.S. dollars) during its release on Sept. 13, making it the biggest opening day for an animated film in Chinese cinemas.

According to statistics released from Maoyan.com, a movie ticket sales platform, "Minions" has pulled in more than 160 million yuan as of Sept. 15.

It usurped "Kung Fu Panda 2" from the top position, which set the record with 53.4 million yuan in 2011.

Domestic animated feature "Monkey King: Hero is Back", which champions the Chinese box office record for domestic animations with 955 million yuan in sales, reaped less than 20 million yuan on its first day.

Serving as a prequel to the "Despicable Me" franchise, the "Minions"' first day ticket sales were five times of that of "Despicable Me 2", which earned a total of 323 million yuan in the Chinese market in 2014.

"My friends and I have all fallen in love with those little yellow creatures that are weird but cute in previous movies," said 24-year-old Ma Xiaoqian, a college student in Beijing. "That's why we couldn't wait and managed to see the 'Minions' at its premiere."

Han Haoyue, a famous movie critic, owned the animated movie's success to the distinctive Minion characters.

"For animation, catchy images of characters are more important than good stories," he said in his article published in the Beijing Times on Tuesday.

Another factor contributing to the film's great popularity is that it caters to all groups, men or women, young or old, added Han.

"The 'Minions' is a perfect movie for families to go to cinemas and watch. The kids, adults and elderly would laugh together and just love the adorkable Minions," Microblog Sino Weibo user "Spring-lubianshe" wrote.

Han believed "Minions" has shed some light on the domestic movie industry, suggesting Chinese filmmakers think about making a spin-off series on Huba, an animated monster from the movie "Monster Hunt", a homegrown live-action animation that set the record for highest-grossing film in the Chinese market in September.

"Minions" has reached 1.08 billion U.S. dollars so far, almost reaching top-earner "Frozen" with 1.28 billion U.S. dollars in ticket sales.

With such rapid success in only a matter of days, "Minions" is expected to break the record and become the biggest animated film ever. Endi