Welcome to Dragonball Evolution!

Dragonball Evolution is a 2009 American live-action film adaptation of the Japanese Dragon Ball media franchise produced by 20th Century Fox. The story centers around the adventures of the lead character, Goku, around his 18th birthday. The film began development in 2002, and is directed by James Wong and produced by Stephen Chow. It was released in Japan and several other Asian nations on March 13, 2009, and was in the United States on April 10, 2009.

Justin Chatwin was cast as Goku, and James Marsters portrays Lord Piccolo, the antagonist of the film. A video game of the same name was released in April 17 for the PSP.

On its opening weekend in the United States, the film grossed $4,756,488 ranking #8 at the box office. In its second weekend, it dropped to eleventh place. As of May 04, 2009, the film had a domestic gross earning of $$8,996,000 and a worldwide gross of $55,862,906. However the film was very successful in Asia, being number 1 in multiple countries.

Development

In March 2002, 20th Century Fox acquired feature film rights to the Dragon Ball franchise. In June 2004, Ben Ramsey, who wrote The Big Hit, was paid $500,000 to adapt Dragonball Z. In 2007, James Wong and Stephen Chow were announced as director and producer respectively, and the project was retitled Dragonball. Wong rewrote the script. The first full color image of Justin Chatwin as Goku was released in the 24th issue of Weekly Young Jump. Chow was a Dragon Ball fan, citing its "airy and unstrained story [which] leaves much room for creation", but explained he would only serve as producer because he believes that he should only direct stories he had created. 87Eleven, the stunt performance company that worked on The Matrix and 300, is working on the film. Ariel Shaw, who worked on Wong's entries in the Final Destination series and 300, is visual effects supervisor. Robert MacLachlan, who also worked on Wong's Final Destination films, serves as cinematographer. The film was originally slated to be named Dragonball, however on December 10, 2008, a trailer was released using the name Dragonball Evolution and Fox licensed the domain name "DragonballEvolutionMovie.com" indicating the film had been renamed.

Differing costs to produce the film have been reported. In January 2008, Masters spoke to TV Guide that he was told the film had a budget of approximately $100 million. In April 2009, the Spanish television station Telecinco reported that the budget was $45 million.