Director James Cameron recalls how he used Titanic to shut down studio notes he didn't agree with for Avatar. Released in 2009, the first Avatar film was a massive success, earning strong reviews from critics and eventually becoming the highest-grossing movie of all time. The film follows marine Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) as he joins forces with the native inhabitants of an alien planet called Pandora to fight off a force of human invaders. Following the film's success, it was announced that there would be four additional Avatar sequels, the first of which, Avatar: The Way of Water, releases later this year.
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Although Avatar introduced Cameron to younger audiences, the director had been a highly-respected figure in Hollywood for decades prior to the movie's release. Cameron not only directed The Terminator but also its even more successful sequel, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, as well as Aliens. In 1997, 20th Century Fox released Titanic, Cameron's romantic epic set aboard the doomed 1912 luxury cruise liner, which became the highest-grossing movie of his career until the release of Avatar. Now the director reveals how Titanic's success came in handy while making his 2009 hit.
In a new interview with The New York Times, Cameron recalls disagreeing with 20th Century Fox about several aspects of Avatar, namely its runtime and the amount of time devoted to various flying sequences. Despite positive reactions from test screenings, the studio was adamant that more trimming needed to be done, which led Cameron to put his foot down and remind executives that Titanic's success essentially paid for the expensive new building they were meeting in. Check out Cameron's full comment below:
“I think I felt, at the time, that we clashed over certain things. For example, the studio felt that the film should be shorter and that there was too much flying around on the ikran—what the humans call the banshees. Well, it turns out that’s what the audience loved the most, in terms of our exit polling and data gathering. And that’s a place where I just drew a line in the sand and said, ‘You know what? I made ‘Titanic.’ This building that we’re meeting in right now, this new half-billion dollar complex on your lot? Titanic paid for that, so I get to do this.’”
The director's comment affirms that even with hits like Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Aliens, Cameron was still subject to studio notes. Of course, having directed Titanic, one of the highest-grossing movies of all time, he clearly had more bargaining power than the average director. Although Cameron doesn't go into detail about why the studio wanted the movie to be shorter, it could have been because they wanted to maximize the number of screenings that could take place in a day, thus increasing the film's box office potential. Considering Avatar remains the highest-grossing movie of all time, the runtime evidently did not deter audiences from turning out in droves.
With Cameron continuing to innovate and use new technology for filming Avatar: The Way of Water and its sequels, it's likely that audiences are in for some breathtaking sequences that exceed what the director accomplished with the ikran in the original film. With Avatar's box office numbers speaking for themselves, Cameron has been allowed to take a big swing with the Avatar franchise, which is something that not many other directors would have the opportunity to do. Although green-lighting four Avatar sequels remains a risky move, Cameron has proven time and time again that he's not one to bet against.