The movie Super Mario Bros. will be released digitally this week in the United States | VGC

The movie Super Mario Bros. will be available digitally beginning Tuesday, May 16 in the United States.

The film will be available exclusively on digital platforms where customers can purchase or rent films from Universal Pictures Home Entertainment. It will cost $29.99 to buy it.

Release dates for the film’s video-on-demand outside of the United States have yet to be announced.

The Super Mario Bros. movie, which is a co-production between Illumination (Minions, Despicable Me) and Nintendo, has grossed over $1.2 billion worldwide since its release in early April.

It’s the biggest movie of 2023 so far, ahead of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, both of which have grossed just under $476 million to date, according to Box Office Mojo. It is also only the 10th animated film to reach the billion dollar milestone.

Speaking on Nintendo’s quarterly earnings call last week, Chairman Shuntaro Furukawa said the film had a positive impact on the company’s core games business.

“In terms of impact on our business, in the short term, box office revenue and secondary uses of the film will be reported as sales in the current fiscal year (ending March 2024),” a- he declared.

“But what’s more important is that the film inspires interest in Mario games and has a positive effect on sales of Nintendo Switch hardware and software in the medium to long term. In fact, we are already seeing a variety of positive effects.

“For example, sales are increasing for Mario-related products, and there is a slight increase in activity for classic Mario titles that can be played via Nintendo Switch Online.

“In the long term, we believe it will become a powerful touchpoint, turning people who have never really played games before into Mario and Nintendo fans, and renewing the interest of people who played (on a Nintendo gaming platform) but take a break.

Furukawa added, “As for the future, we plan to focus our efforts on a variety of visual content, as we did last year with the consolidation of Nintendo Pictures Co., Ltd. as a subsidiary. We are very happy that this film is a success, but we will remain focused on developing and expanding each IP while respecting its unique characteristics, as we have done in the past.

“Through our strategy of increasing the number of people with access to Nintendo IP, we want to connect people with our characters and the worlds represented in our games, with the goal of continually invigorating our core business as a dedicated video games.”