A Track of Memories

A Track of Memories is a 2023 Japanese-American-British-Australian anime film based on the 2022 video game Pokémon Legends: Arceus. Produced by The Pokémon Company, OLM, Inc., Toho, the British Film Institute, Baby Cow Productions, Good Universe, Skydance Media, and Screen Australia and distributed by Vue International and Showcase Cinemas, the film was directed by Takashi Yamazaki and Fawn Veerasunthorn from a screenplay by Yamazaki, Tetsuo Yajima and Anthony and Joe Russo. It focuses on Ingo, one of the Subway Bosses from Nimbasa City in the modern-day Unova region, being sent far back in time from Unova to the region of Hisui and suffering from severe memory loss as a result before subsquently joining the Pearl Clan and befriending many other residents of Hisui, even including the rivalling Diamond Clan, while Emmet, who is still in modern-day Unova and with Elesa, Skyla, Drayden, Iris, Looker, and Anabel in tow, set out to find Ingo and reunite him with Emmet, unearthing the identity of who caused the spacetime rift that sent Ingo to Hisui in the process. The ensemble voice cast includes Jordan Reynolds, Tyler Bunch, McKenna Grace, Grant Feely, Sonia Manzano, Jason Momoa, Zooey Deschanel, Jack Dylan Grazer, Kristen Chenoweth, Helena Bonham Carter, Kenan Thompson, Paul Rudd, Kimiko Glenn, Levi Miller, Kumail Nanjiani, Elizabeth Olsen, George Takei, Taylor Swift, Sarah Natochenny, Mike Pollock, Anairis Quiñones, Ryan Reynolds, Amanda Hufford, Christian Bale, and Josh Brolin.
Production on the film lasted from January to June 2022 on a budget of $25 million, with the animation provided by Production I.G. and TMS Entertainment. On January 24, 2023, it was announced that The Pokémon Company struck an unprecedented distribution deal with Vue International and Showcase Cinemas, both of whom are movie-theater companies with the former based in the UK and the latter based in America respectively, for the film outside of Japan after negotiations with the major film studios and streaming services had fell through. The unconventional release strategy was a topic of media discourse; many journalists, Pokémon fans and industry personnel praised Yamazaki and Veerasunthorn's decision to bypass the studios to directly partner with theaters and opined that the move defies the traditional producer-distributor-exhibitor model of releasing films. Vue and Showcase released the film worldwide except for in Japan, in which the film was released there by Toho Cinemas.
The film was released in theaters worldwide on August 6, 2023, to which it was met with significant ticket demand, amassing a record $90 million on its first day of presales in both Japan and the US and over $200 million in total global presales. A Track of Memories became the highest-grossing anime film of all time and the highest-grossing film in the Pokémon franchise, earning $1.678 billion worldwide, making it the second anime film to top the annual global box-office since Demon Slayer: Kitmesu no Yaiba - The Movie: Mugen Train (2020).