Golden Globes - Best Motion Picture Drama

Avatar was awarded the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture Drama this evening, and heads into the Academy Awards as a short priced favorite for Best Picture. The award for Avatar followed director James Cameron picking up the best director award earlier in the evening. Even if Avatar isn’t successful at the Academy Awards, the picture is heading for new records, and is currently set to become the highest grossing film of all time. Director James Cameron took the opportunity to say that those in the room had the best jobs in the world, and said that he believed that Avatar represented the best of cinema.

Photo, left to right: Sam Worthington (Jake Sully), James Cameron (director), Zoe Saldana (Neytiri), Jon Landaupose (producer), Sigourney Weaver (Dr. Grace Augustine)

Golden Globe - Best Director

The winner of the Best Director Golden Globe is James Cameron for his work on the groundbreaking epic, Avatar. Cameron accepts his award from his real life neighbor, Gibson, saying, "I'm going to try to make this as brief as I can because frankly I have to pee something fierce. I'm actually not well-prepared because frankly I thought Kathryn [Bigelow, director of The Hurt Locker] was going to get this so I'm kind of winging it here. She richly deserves it, but make no mistake, I'm very grateful." Cameron then thanked and recognized the work of his fine cast, thanking them for their outstanding work by speaking Na'vi.

"Avatar" Hits 1.6 Billion

James Cameron's Avatar has now earned $1.6 Billion. In an unprecedented display of strength, Avatar led the worldwide box office for a fifth consecutive weekend, fast catching up on all-time champ Titanic, distributor 20th Century Fox said on Sunday (1/17/10). Cameron's sci-fi epic has now earned $1.6 Billion, just $237 Million short of the $1.8 Billion record set by the filmmaker's Titanic in 1998. "Titanic was a ship. Avatar's a rocket ship," said Chris Aronson, Fox's senior vice-president of domestic distribution. The North American contribution stands at $491.8 Million (the third-highest tally of all time) thanks to a $41.3 Million weekend. Fox, a unit of News Corp, expects it to hit $500 Million on Monday, when business will get a boost from the U.S. Martin Luther King holiday. That will mark the Avatar's 32nd day of release. By contrast, Titanic took 98 days to reach that tally on its way to a record $601 Million. Keep in mind, Avatar sales are inflated by higher ticket prices in general and premium pricing for 3-D screenings. Avatar is enjoying strong holds every weekend. In the current period, it was off just 18%. Titanic was the last movie to lead the box office for five consecutive weekends, although Avatar might struggle to reach its record of 15 unbroken weekends. The foreign total stands at $1.1 Billion after a $125 Million weekend. Avatar trails the Titanic overseas haul of $1.2 Billion by just $127 Million. Avatar, the tale of a disabled ex-Marine sent from Earth to infiltrate a race of 10-foot (3-meter) blue aliens and persuade them to let his employer mine their homeland for natural resources, is reportedly the most expensive film ever made, with a budget of at least $300 million.



For all those who didn't believe that Avatar could surpass Titanic's $1.8 Billion first place trophy spot, think again. For all those who believed in Avatar's inevitable domination (includes myself), thank you for helping that becom a reality. All we can do now is wait for Avatar to dethrone Titanic, something that even James Cameron himself has said will happen.

"Avatar" Now the Second Biggest Film of All Time

The box office dominance of Avatar continues, with the news that James Cameron's film has now become the second biggest of all time. It's taken less than three weeks for the film to achieve this, and on day 20, its takings worldwide stood at $1.135 Billion. That's seen it overtake Lord Of The Rings: Return Of The King's $1.119 Billion, and the only film that stands ahead of it is Cameron's own Titanic. Its take of $1.843 Billion seems to be out of Avatar's reach to some, but I doubt it. Even if you take into the account of inflation, the higher cost of ticket prices and the fact that many are paying a premium to watch the film in 3D, this is a staggering achievement to say the least. This means that, for the fourth time in his career, Cameron has made the most expensive film of all time (Terminator 2, True Lies, Titanic and now Avatar), and each time he's won the gamble and made huge sums of money the other side. Is there any stopping of the Avatar juggernaut? Probably not.

"Avatar" Makes Fastest $1 Billion

Avatar, the highly promoted and largely computer generated movie distributed by 20th Century Fox in December has become the fastest ever film to gross $1 Billion at the box office in ticket sales. While some commentators have been quick to point out that this rapid revenue is due, in part, to the premium price attracted by 3D movies, the swift sales for Avatar mean that, just weeks after its premier, Avatar is already the fourth highest grossing film at box office in history, the top four currently consists of:

Titanic – $1.8bn
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King – $1.12bn
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest – $1.07bn
Avatar – $1bn

With the film not even out in Italy – where it is scheduled for a 15th January release – it is highly likely that, following a January with few big movies coming to screens, Avatar will overtake all those above it in the current list to become the biggest selling movie in history. What is astounding is that Avatar passed the billion dollar mark in just 17 days, making $350m in the US alone and over $670m in the rest of the world. With many fans deciding to watch the movie multiple times and many non movie-goers deciding that the 3D experience and huge budget spent by director James Cameron on this movie is sufficient draw to pull them into theatres, Avatar is proving to provide real return on investment. Bert Livingston, a distribution expert for 20th Century Fox explained: "I think everybody has to see Avatar once, even people who don’t normally go to the movies, they’ve heard about it and are saying, 'I have to see it'."