Avatar on course to sink Titanic at the box office

Avatar has had phenomenal success at the box office

Avatar is on course to become the highest grossing film of all time, making $1.14bn (£700m) since its release less than three weeks ago.

The Hollywood Reporter said James Cameron's film had overtaken the $1.12bn (£699m) taken by The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

But Cameron still has a way to go to top Titanic's $1.84bn (£1.14bn).

It is thought that Avatar's huge box office takings are partly due to the higher cost of 3D film tickets.

Titanic, which starred Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio and won the best director Oscar for Cameron, made a new box office record during its release from 1997-1998.

Most expensive

Earlier this month, Avatar became the fastest movie ever to achieve $1bn (£623m) in ticket sales around the world.

Distributors 20th Century Fox said it had earned more than $350m (£218m) in the US and more than $670m (£417m) across the rest of the world in only 17 days.

The sci-fi epic, about a disabled marine who infiltrates a race of giant blue aliens, mixes live action with digitally-created performances.

It was reportedly the most expensive film ever made, with a budget of at least $300m (£187m).

In December, Cameron said the movie could be the first part of a trilogy.

"I feel like I have to make a second one now, but that'll only happen if we make some money with the first one.

"I have a story worked out for the second film, and the third film, but my lips are sealed," he said.

Meanwhile, it has also been reported that Cameron has set his sights on another project.

According to film magazine Empire, the director has bought the rights to Charles Pellegrino's soon-to-be published The Last Train From Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back.

The book chronicles two days during and after the atomic bomb drops at the end of the Second World War, using eyewitness accounts from Japanese civilians and American pilots who survived the experience.

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Commentary

Just saw this movie in Imax, having my first Imax experience, and I have to say it was well worth it.

I mean I saw the movie before on lower quality but Imax is definitely worth the 16 dollars I paid. I also brought along 4 people as most of us do when seeing films, and thus helped possibly sink Titanic.

Does this movie deserve to sink Titanic? As far as inflation, no. As far as reaching that 1.8 billion mark, yes.

James Cameron, you did a wonderful job. Terminator 4 would not have even been possible without you launching the series sky high with T2.
Don't forget the short but amazing T.v series Dark Angel.

Harry Potter actors look to the future - My Take on the Series and Movies as a Whole

Harry Potter actors look to the future

Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint talk Half-Blood Prince, Hallows and the future

By Tim Masters Entertainment correspondent, BBC News

With filming on the final two parts of the Harry Potter series under way, the young actors who have grown up on the set and become global superstars are now considering their next steps.

We asked them whether it would be a case of deathly silence after the Deathly Hallows...

The child actors were cast in the summer of 2000

As you might expect, Daniel Radcliffe - who has kept busy on both film and stage projects in between playing Harry - laughs off the idea that the rest of his life might be an anti-climax.

"No man, I've got kids to have yet!" he says excitedly, despite nursing a sore throat on the cold, cavernous film set at Leavesden Studios in Hertfordshire.

"They're going to keep me busy if I do - which I hope I do at some point. I'm not planning on it soon - that's one of the things I'm really looking forward to doing."

The 20-year-old adds: "What's been cool is that I've been here when a lot of people here have had kids while on the film, and I've seen the change it's made in their life and how amazing it is."

His co-star Rupert Grint, 21, who plays Ron Weasley, says he has no doubt that Harry Potter will be the "biggest thing" he will be involved with.

"I make the most of it and enjoy it," he says.

Tom Felton on filming the saga's final films, what his future holds and how he has never seen Star Wars

"It is quite scary when this all ends because we're stepping out into the real world - it is quite a bubble I suppose, we've had these films to do every year and it's become quite a routine.

"I'm definitely going to miss it. It's been a great 10 years. I am quite keen to move on and see what else is out there."

Grint, speaking at the launch of the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince DVD, says he is interested in more parts like the "bad boy" role he gets to play in his forthcoming movie Cherrybomb.

The coming-of-age drama premiered at the Berlin Film Festival earlier this year, but failed to find a distributor.

Fans set up an online petition for its release, and producers now say a distribution deal has been signed, and the Belfast-set movie should be in cinemas in 2010.

I think it's just because I'm ginger they throw me into the frame Rupert Grint

"It's nice because it's so different," says Grint. "That's what attracted me to it - it wasn't really a conscious thing to move away.

"It was really fun to be on a different set and experience a whole different budget - it was quite a shock. I really enjoyed it and hopefully I will get to do more films like that."

He dismisses press speculation that he's in the running to play Prince Harry in a film called The Spare that's due to shoot next year.

"I think it's just because I'm ginger they throw me into the frame, but I haven't really heard anything about it," he says.

Actress Emma Watson, 19, who plays Hermione Granger, began studying at an American university in September, though she hasn't ruled out acting projects out of term-time.

Fellow actress Bonnie Wright, 18, has just begun a degree course in film and TV in London. She has played Ron's sister Ginny Weasley since the first film in 2001.

Personally I think a greater project is out there Bonnie Wright

Speaking on the set at Leavesden, she points out that she's spent more than half of her life working on Harry Potter.

"Although it has been massive," she says, "personally I think a greater project is out there. That's what makes me keep working, knowing that there's this project out there that I'm yet to do."

David Heyman, who has produced all of the Harry Potter films, is confident that the global stars that he's helped create will go on to further success.

"They've had a good structure here and at home, they are pretty solid kids," he says.

"They are going to go and have great fun - they are going to have great success. I'm sure they will thrive."

He adds: "I think they all know I'm here to support them, and if they ever want a chat I'll be there for them.

"Ultimately they've got to leave the fold and take flight - and I know they will."

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is out on DVD on 7 December

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Commentary

I loved the books and re-read the 3rd, 4th, and 5th books to get ready for the 6th and 7th ones. What's funny is i started by reading the 3rd book after seeing the first 2 movies. Then I read the 4th book and then the 5th. After a while I went back and read the first and second book and decided to reread the series continuing onwards to prepare for the newest 6th book.

The movie that is truest to the books is probably the 2nd one, Chamber of Secrets, which follows the book almost to the tee. My favorite book is probably the 4th one, Goblet of Fire. That's really the climax of the story and where it becomes an adult book.

My favorite movie was probably the 3rd one because of the overall feel and the creepiness we really don't witness again in any of the other movies.

The actors are great and the best actor hands down is the one who plays Ron; Rupert Grint I think his name is. He feels so natural on camera and everything seems so unscripted.

My favorite character in the series is probably either Hermione or Hagrid. Snape was definitely the most interesting one.

I hope all these actors do really well in the future and I wish them all the best. I also hope the writer of Harry potter starts up a new series that has nothing to do with Harry or magic.

A first look at Avatar

By Daniel Emery BBC technology reporter, Los Angeles

Early shots suggest Avatar will look very impressive

"Before you go any further sir, I'm going to need your phone, your laptop, your bag, and any photographic equipment you may have on you."

We're being stripped of all our technology at the start of a press briefing. A process which is, to say the least, unusual.

But this is an unusual press conference; we are about to get the first look at Titanic director James Cameron's new action adventure movie Avatar and see Ubisoft's game of the same name.

We are ushered into a room, one side of which is filled with an enormous 103in plasma screen; a working prototype from Panasonic. The walls are plastered with concept art.

Then out steps Jon Landau, the film's producer, who runs through the basic plot.

"The script for Avatar started 14 years ago, but back then, the technology to make a film like that did not exist," he said.

New territory

The film - and game - follows the exploits of a paralysed marine called Jake Sully who is sent to the beautiful, but dangerous, world of Pandora to help a mining corporation extract a mineral Mr Landau called "unobtanium".

Humans cannot breathe the air on Pandora, so they have to travel - and work - in cumbersome airtight suits.

The game revolves around the battle for Pandora

However, Pandora does have an indigenous population - the Na'vi - a race of 10 foot tall creatures who have no interest in helping humanity exploit, and ultimately destroy, their planet.

So the corporation has created a hybrid creature from both human and Na'vi DNA that is controlled via a mental link by a human operator: the Avatar.

Trouble is, every creature on the planet - plant and animal, including the Na'vi - now want humans off the planet and will use any and every means at their disposal to drive them off.

Humanity is engaged in a fight for survival on Pandora, and it is into this environment that Jake Sully is dropped.

"Our industry has not created a new universe in 32 years," said Mr Landau. "We have now."

A reference, if ever there was one, to George Lucas' Star Wars which made its debut in 1977.

Both the game and film were developed in tandem; so much so that ideas from game developer Ubisoft were incorporated into the movie.

The game, an action adventure shooter, faithfully replicates the movie environment; in stereoscopic 3D if your monitor is capable.

The graphics, from the little we saw, were impressive and on a par with how stunning Crysis was when it made its public debut.

Foliage, creatures, characters, and weapons are superbly rendered. By day, the environment is a lush - but oppressive - jungle. At night the entire planet glows with bioluminescence, making the world look even more alien than it already is.

However, this is just a backdrop to the game, which is predominantly about combat.

Fighting talk

Mr Landau stressed that the game's plot was not a carbon copy of the film.

While the film goes into avatar mode fairly early on, the game lets you play as a human soldier fighting his way through the jungle as the various jungle life forms try their best to kill you.

The game also lets you play as a Na'vi warrior. While humans may have a technological edge, they also have every plant and animal out to get them. For the Na'vi, this flora and fauna are not just friends, they are allies.

In the demonstration we were shown how a Na'vi warrior could climb on the back of a large winged creature that could then be used to knock helicopters out of the sky.

Mr Landau said that Jake Sully changes sides and helps the Na'vi "lead a revolution to force the humans - and avatars - off Pandora".

The catch, said Mr Landau, is that when Sully is in avatar mode, he is fully mobile; back in human form, he is confined to a wheelchair.

"It's a moral dilemma that he will have to face."

It remains to be seen if this moral dilemma from the movie will be replicated in the game.

Both film and game are due for release at the end of 2009.

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