In 2009, James Cameron scored another mega-blockbuster with a different kind of film, full of CGI and betting heavily on its 3D version at a time when it wasn’t really a trend. At the same time, he broke the record he had with Titanic (88%) , another film he made, which was not only remembered as one of the most awarded films in an edition of the Oscars, but also surpassed himself. same in terms of box office since it was this that had raised more money until the Na’vi arrived to make history.
At the same time, the director pushed his limits with this ambitious project done in mostly CGI. Avatar (83%) represented a breakthrough in film technology, with stunning images of the moon Pandora, its lush vegetation and fascinating creatures. In the film, ex-Marine Jake Sully ( Sam Worthington ) is deployed to Pandora as part of a team attempting to mine vast amounts of a power-generating mineral known as unobtanium, despite an indigenous species of humanoids called the Na’vi already lives there.
No one can deny the impact that Avatar had on filmmaking, although many times there are those who deny that it has achieved anything like that. Beyond its box office, building the world of Pandora required a lot of work, be it computer rendering, the design of each landscape and creature, the creation of a language and even the task of fitting the live-action performances with the universe. that was created digitally. From a project of this scope and magnitude there are always things that can be learned.
For that reason, we collected some extremely interesting facts from Avatar (83%) and Avatar: El Camino del Agua that you may not have known.
The projects are so expensive that you need to raise $2 billion to break even
If Avatar was a challenge, Avatar: El Camino del Agua represented double the work (and risks) for the studio, so it was logical that it would be reflected in the fact that monetarily the project would need more money to not be considered a failure. According to the director himself, the sci-fi film is bound to fetch more than $2 billion at the box office to barely break even. A report shared by The Hollywood Reporter indicated that the film’s budget is between US$350 million to US$450 million, even without the advertising expenses that also seem high due to the number of ads that have been found.
James Cameron revealed that the idea for Avatar came to him in a dream he had at the age of 19
The director of Avatar may have taken making his dreams come true a bit too seriously. This is more literal than it seems, since according to what he told GQ magazine, the ideas he used for the film actually came to him at the age of 19, when he dreamed of them. He knew the project wouldn’t be easy, but he started by drawing what would later become early concept art, until he managed to establish himself as a filmmaker since a story like Avatar wasn’t something a studio would risk that easily. This was what he detailed:
I woke up after dreaming about this kind of bioluminescent forest, with these trees that look like fiber optic lamps and this river that glowed with bioluminescent particles and some kind of purple moss on the ground that lit up when you walked on it. And these kinds of lizards that didn’t look like much until they took off. And then they turned into these spinning fans, like living frisbees, and they come down and land on something. It was all in the dream. I woke up super excited and actually drew it. So I actually have a drawing.
During the same interview, Cameron said that having proof that his idea for Avatar came about many years ago saved him from any attempted lawsuits he might receive today, should he be accused of plagiarism.
He saved us from about 10 lawsuits. Any successful movie, there’s always some tinfoil-wearing monster under his wig who thinks you’ve gotten the idea out of his head. And it turned out that there were 10 or 11 of them. So I pointed to this drawing that I did when I was 19, when I was going to college, and I said, “See this? See these glowing trees? See this circling glowing lizard that’s orange? See the purple moss? And they all left.
Cigarettes are CGI
Although Avatar was being scrutinized by those who criticized the number of cigarettes that appear throughout the footage, these were actually CGI. Shortly after, the director came out to say that he was against smoking, but that did not mean that the film was not to blame for having created that impression with characters who do not stop smoking in the story. Fortunately, they were all added by computer and, for example, the actressSigourney Weaverhe had to pretend to smoke in his scenes so that cigarettes would be computer-added later. The original intention was to show that her character was not interested in being a role model.
The film was edited at the same time as it was filmed
Although not so curious that Avatar was edited while filming, it is a different case since the final product is mostly added by computer. The film’s editors told Popular Mechanics that their department was very involved from the beginning, since they had to separate the live-action shots from the rest, in something they called performance editing, and that it didn’t matter if they didn’t have the same angles anymore. that they needed to see if everything was going as required. James Cameron approved the performances and then the material was sent to those who created the digital part, and this process was repeated throughout the filming as a kind of “pre-post production”.
The director’s cameo
Cameron is no exception among directors who love to appear in their movies. Here he did it in a rather unique way, since it is rare to see him in front of the camera. His voice is a regular feature in his movies, and in Avatar he did it again. In the movie he appeared as a pilot, and although he is quite subtle he can be heard as one of the pilots of Scorpion Gunships during the dramatic attack on Hometree.
Sounds from Jurassic Park were recycled
Every James Cameron movie has amazing detail, and Avatar is no slouch. The mega-blockbuster borrowed a few elements from a movie classic that went on to become the highest-grossing movie of all time:Jurassic Park (93%). In sound design, this filmmaker is known for pushing creative boundaries, so he didn’t mind borrowing something from a big movie. In his first foray into the potential franchise, Jake comes face to face with the Thanator, a predator designed by James Cameron himself . The curious? The roar of him is taken from the 1996 movie and belongs to the Tyrannosaurus Rex.
In China, a mountain is named after Avatar from the movie
The Avatar team based the look of Pandora’s floating mountains on an impressive pillared structure found in Zhangjiajie National Forest Park that had inspired Cameron, and the film’s success inspired China to rename one. of those pillars. What was first known as the Southern Sky Pillar was renamed Avatar Hallelujah Mountain because, according to the park, it is the pillar that inspired Cameron the most. Interestingly, he is against the Chinese government which pulled the film for fear of a citizen uprising.