It’s Crossed James Cameron’s Mind ‘We Could Be Getting High on Our Own Supply’ with ‘Avatar 3’
Hey, the planet’s called Pandora. There’ve gotta be some surprises in James Cameron’s cinematic box that might leave viewers unsettled, right?
That’s what’s crossed the director’s mind, anyway, while winding down post-production on “Avatar: Fire and Ash,” the third installment of his space saga about ruthless capitalists displacing the indigenous Na’vi in their rapacious quest for Unobtanium.
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In a new interview with Empire, Cameron noted that he’s well ahead of where the first sequel, “The Way of Water,” was in the leadup to its 2022 release. The films were mostly shot over five years ago, with just a years-long VFX and post-production process in their wake.
“It’s in strong shape, I think,” he told the U.K. outlet. “We’ve doubled the number of shots finished at this stage of the game than we had on movie two [and] the films are about equal length. So that puts us well ahead of the curve, which is something I’ve never, frankly, experienced before.” Laughing, he added that the process is “a little bit less nightmarish. We’re getting to the point where we’re actually getting good at this.”
“Yeah, we’ve got some really clever action set-pieces,” Cameron said. “You can get your blood up in this movie. But what excites me as an artist who recently turned 70 and has kind of done all that stuff is not only the opportunity to get to do it again, but to get to a level of character and intrigue you haven’t seen before in an ‘Avatar’ movie.”
That sounds like the stance of an artist who’s really not interested in just delivering more of the same. But as we know from other franchise films that tried to subvert their mythos a tad, or at least deliver some narrative swerves, as “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” did, fans sometimes don’t want bold swings.
“We’re just starting to riff on it and twist it and turn it,” Cameron says, of where this third installment fits in the overall five-movie saga he has planned. “It’s a tricky thing. We could be getting high on our own supply here, and everybody who looks at it goes, ‘Fuck, that’s not what I signed up for.’ But if you’re not making brave choices, you’re wasting everybody’s time and money. That alone is not sufficient to create success, but it’s necessary. You’ve got to break the mould every fricking time.”
For our part, we’re just disappointed “Avatar 3” is no longer called “Avatar: The Seed Bearer” as originally rumored several years ago.
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