Finally, Cameron's Next: Avatar

The man is a frickin' genius...nuff said.

I think that if he really has found some material with sufficient oomph, he's got the chops to do something good with it.

So he's gonna do it after the years of talk, eh? Even if the movie winds up sucking (which it may well not) I fully believe him when he says it will slam you to the back wall of the theater.

You have to admit he does have a fairly high self-imposed bar to jump when he makes movies now...
If you look at his oeuvre...it is nothing less than spectacular.
I have many, many memories of great moments in his movies.

And he isn't a guy who sits back on his laurels and cashes checks for directing this or that movie.
He doesn't take the easy way out...

Did he have any sort of 'level of profits' based payoff on Titanic? If so, he probably certainly doesn't need to be doing anything unless he's really into it.

True.

He probably can just follow his muse.
More power to him.

Paramount has a movie by the same name by M Knight and they own the rights to the title "Avatar" so Cameron has to choose a new name for his film.

This isn't 'found material'. I believe that Cameron wrote/is writing the whole thing himself.

And it sounds like he's developing the next generation in the Andy Serkis/Gollum approach to artificial characters.

Very Funny, Penman.
Thanx for posting it.

I've always gotten the impression from the few appearences i've seen taht he's incredibly egotistical. But the commentary tracks he's put out have really changed my perception. More to point, i've always respected the fact that he really strives to put out the highest quality DVD releases of his movies. The T2 Extreme DVD is one of the best pictures i have in my collection. I just don't understand why film makers don't push to have the best release for their movies, let alone why so many (Wachowski, Malick, et al) don't bother with any extras. I LOVE the insight Cameron and others give on the commentaries.

This movie sounds very promising. Never even thought about his absence, but it has been almost 10 years!

WTF?
They are still letting him make movies?
WOW!

I figure you don't get to be a director of huge movies by being a wall flower :-) You'd have to have some level of ego required to impose your will and nail that big a blob of jello to the wall. But he is intelligent and I've also appreciated his commentaries. I think that there are people who are very good at directing but just don 'give good commentary', but some folks are really good at it. I usually find that first time directors, who just had their dream come true doing their breakout movie, do best, but it's also good to hear a real veteran who can dispense a lot of insights.

I'm still waiting for Aquaman.

I think he made a total of $500 million off Titanic.

He scheduled Aquaman?
Did not know.
Aquaman is OK, but Sub-Mariner really does it for me.

He's a Canadian......he HAS to be a nice guy! Its in our genes!

Exactly what I tell my in-laws...
For some reason, they don't seem to believe me...

Favelle, you just reminded me of an hilarious bit of dialog from the so-so action movie "Vertical Limit." One of the characters is a beautiful but sometimes witchy climber. Her husband (?) is talking to the main character, who is obviously frustrated by her obstreperous nature: "She's French-Canadian. Somedays she's Canadian, and can be quite pleasant. Today, she's obviously French."

The description sounds kinda like some of the Ender Wiggins novel by Orson Scott Card (loosely)

Hey, Mike. Shouldn't you be working? Never mind the fact that I get off at 6:30. Sticking to the topic, though, this sounds like one to watch for. I've really enjoyed his other films and can only imaging what "better than Kong" CG would look like.

It's too bad that many people in our society confuse arrogance with confidence.Especially when those people get a well deserved success like Cameron. He's also a hard worker and naturally he demands the same from people who works for him. He also pushes the envelope, and a perfectionist. Clearly a horrible man!

Clearly you're not an Entourage fan.

Cameron is an obsessive perfectionist who demands the very best from everyone who works for him and has a habit of micro-managing every aspect of his productions. I have no doubt that he's a real pain in the ass to work for, but he certainly gets nothing less than the results that he wants.

That sounds a bit high, even with it's huge earnings. Can anyone verify that?

yeah it is a bit high..i read it on imdb at one point and was going off memory

but if you check his imdb bio, it says $115,000,000

http://imdb.com/name/nm0000116/bio

I initially thought he had a 20% backend deal...20% x 2,000,000,000 = 400,000,000 and the studio had given him $100,000,000 additionally for the overall box office success and academy award win. So... 400 + 100 = 500, and he was using that to finance all these big budget productions (battle angel, avatar) but I guess not.

I recall Mr. Murdoch was pissed about paying Cameron so much money.

Those damn artists!

Right, he probably would admit to that, but most of his critics never worked for him or even in the industry.