Variety reports that Hayao Miyazaki’s latest film Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea grossed $14.8 million over the three-day weekend of July 19-21 in Japan. Studio Ghibli’s last feature Tales from Earthsea had grossed $8.4 million in its opening frame in 2006. Ponyo‘s opening box-office gross was 96.6 percent of the similar three-day holiday bow of Miyazaki’s Sprited Away in 2001. This also compares with $13.9 million for the opening weekend of Hayao Miyazaki’s previous film Howl’s Moving Castle in 2004.