Avatar

[diggler]

am i the only one that kinda liked it?

[Stefen]

haha. sigourney weaver as an alien.





MORE. http://marketsaw.blogspot.com/2009/08/pandoras-box-opened-new-avatar-stills.html

[MacGuffin]

'Avatar' tickets already on sale
James Cameron pic hits theaters Dec. 18
Source: Hollywood Reporter

James Cameron's "Avatar" won't reach movie theaters for almost four months, but tickets for the much-hyped sci-fi actioner are already on sale.

Touted as a potentially watershed release -- displaying the creative possibilities both of 3D cinema and motion-capture production techniques -- "Avatar" is scheduled for a global bow on Dec. 18. Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment is co-producing with distributor Fox, which has been stoking exhibitors' appetite for the release through screenings of extended clip reels from the film.

On Friday, the studio staged public screenings of a special 16-minute "Avatar" trailer at 100 Imax theaters. Now, AMC has decided to sell tickets to the movie's opening-day midnight performances.

Online ticketers MovieTickets.com and Fandango on Friday began ringing up sales of "Avatar" performances at more than 75 AMC locations, most of them Imax 3D venues.

"Tickets being put on sale for a film four months in advance is unheard of," MovieTickets exec vp Joel Cohen said. "The fact that tickets have already been sold really speaks to the tremendous buzz the film has already created and the power of James Cameron at the box office."

"Avatar" is Cameron's first dramatic feature since 1997's "Titanic," which is still the highest-grossing film of all time.

"Audiences are hungry for fresh fare with original storytelling," Fandango spokesman Harry Medved said. "And with 'Avatar,' you have no idea where the story is going to go."

Sales of the midnight tickets were said to be "healthy."

It was unclear if any other exhibs will follow AMC's lead in offering early advance ticketing on "Avatar." After all, the studio has yet to hammer out film rental terms with circuits -- though that didn't stop the nation's second-biggest circuit from suggesting the early ticketing.

"AMC came up with the idea," Fox senior vp distribution Chris Aronson said. "They said that if all these people are going to come to our theater to see 16 minutes of a film that doesn't open until December, let's give them an opportunity to buy tickets to the first performances of the show itself."

As a practical matter, no one can offer anything but tickets for the first midnight performances, as nobody knows what the final running time will be once Cameron finishes editing "Avatar."

"Avatar" is likely to tote a running time of between 2 and one-half and three hours.

[socketlevel]

this is a desperate move imo, shesh they're really scrambling now.

[matt35mm]

I'm as underwhelmed by the images as anyone, but I still have the feeling like it will be a really good time at the movies.  I still think James Cameron knows how to make a really satisfying movie.  I'm definitely still looking forward to this, and I still think the story idea is pretty cool with loads of potential.  No, the imagery doesn't look as realistic as they've hyped it up to be, but I'll just go in expecting to see a really fun and satisfying animated movie.

[Pas]

Is there any kind of synopsis yet or is it shrouded in mystery? I mean except that (lol)

"One of the leads is a woman named Zuleika, who is described thusly: A NA'VI WOMAN. She is young, and lithe as a cat, with a long, slender neck, muscular shoulders, and nubile breasts... a statuesque vision. Let's not mince words here... she is devastatingly beautiful. For a girl with a tail. In human age she would be in her late teens."

That's absolutely horrible... it reads like a Bill O'Reilly novel.  Seriously, "nubile breasts"?

[MacGuffin]

Is there any kind of synopsis yet or is it shrouded in mystery?

Take your pick:

More than 10 years in the making, Avatar marks Cameron's return to fictional feature-film directing for the first time since 1997's Titanic. The 3-D Avatar centers on ex-marine Jake Sully, who is torn between duty and honor when he finds himself caught in a battle between the heavily armed forces of Earth's most powerful star-faring consortium and an exotic, noble alien race whose entire world is threatened by the human invaders.

Avatar tells the story of an ex-Marine, thrust unwillingly into an effort to settle and exploit an exotic planet rich in bio-diversity, who eventually crosses over to lead the indigenous race in a battle for survival.

"Avatar" tells the story of humans who travel to a distant planet and have their brains linked to cloned versions of a native species in order to explore the otherwise unsafe environment. It will be released in its entirety Dec. 18.

[modage]

[Fernando]

^^ I don't remember who was the first to make a parody of that Downfall scene, but right now they are abusing of it, every single 'deception' or 'angry' moment can be transferred to it without too much effort, that is excluding the first guy who did it, besides because I love the movie these damn parodies are ruining it for me.

I'm as underwhelmed by the images as anyone, but I still have the feeling like it will be a really good time at the movies.  I still think James Cameron knows how to make a really satisfying movie.  I'm definitely still looking forward to this, and I still think the story idea is pretty cool with loads of potential.  No, the imagery doesn't look as realistic as they've hyped it up to be, but I'll just go in expecting to see a really fun and satisfying animated movie.

haha, small jab aside, I completely agree with you, I still hope for the best and it may not change cinema but who cares if it does, I only care that I have a great time at the movies. having said that, the articles of wHorthington and the advance ticket sales are ridiculous.

[MacGuffin]

The Future of Avatar
Exclusive: producer talks sequels/prequels and spin-off book.
by Chris Tilly, IGN UK

While promoting Avatar at Fantastic Fest last week, producer Jon Landau let slip that writer-director James Cameron is planning to pen an accompanying novel after the film hits screens.

That was it in terms of details however, so IGN pursued Landau after the presentation and asked him to elaborate.

"Trying to condense our story into a 140-page screenplay, or two-and-a-half hours of screen time, is no easy task", Landau explained. "There are great ideas and themes and character journeys that we did not have the time to go on in the script or in the movie. I think Jim wants to take the opportunity to flesh those out and make them available to people."

"It' won't be a sequel or prequel, I think the novel will be a novel that spans our story and maybe a little bit beyond it."

So what of the future of the franchise on screen?

"I think we're going to wait to see how the public reacts to the movie. Jim is full of ideas and really great stories that could be told both before our movie and after our movie. But we'll see what the fans want."

So there you have it - Avatar the novel coming soon, while Avatar 2 is pretty much dependant on box office receipts.

[OrHowILearnedTo]

i heard it going to be a pop-up book

[MacGuffin]

3 Minute and 30 Second Avatar Trailer Coming!!
Source: ComingSoon.net

ComingSoon.net has confirmed that 20th Century Fox will debut a new trailer for James Cameron's Avatar in theaters this Friday, October 23rd! The trailer, which clocks in at roughly around 3 minutes and 30 seconds, won't be coming online until October 29th. You should really see this in theaters anyways as we've learned that this is THE trailer, the one that will show you much more story (as opposed to the teaser trailer previously released).

Opening in conventional 3D theaters and IMAX 3D on December 18th, the live action movie with a new generation of special effects stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana, Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez, Giovanni Ribisi, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Peter Mensah, Laz Alonso, Wes Studi, Stephen Lang and Matt Gerald.

Avatar takes us to a spectacular world beyond imagination, where a reluctant hero embarks on a journey of redemption and discovery as he leads an epic battle to save a civilization. James Cameron, the Oscar-winning director of Titanic, first conceived the film years ago, when the means to realize his vision did not yet exist. Now, after four years of actual production work, Avatar delivers a fully immersive cinematic experience of a new kind, where the revolutionary technology invented to make the film disappears into the emotion of the characters and the sweep of the story.

The story's hero is Jake Sully, a former Marine confined to a wheelchair. Bitter and disillusioned, he's still a warrior at heart. All Jake ever wanted was something worth fighting for, and he finds it in the place he least expected: on a distant world. Jake has been recruited to join an expedition to the moon Pandora, which corporate interests are strip-mining for a mineral worth $20 billion per kilogram on Earth. To facilitate their work, the humans use a link system that projects a person's consciousness into a hybrid of humans and Pandora's indigenous humanoids, the Na'vi. This human-Na'vi hybrid – a fully living, breathing body that resembles the Na'vi but possesses the individual human's thoughts, feelings and personality – is known as an "avatar."

In his new avatar form, Jake can once again walk. His mission is to interact with and infiltrate the Na'vi with the hope of enlisting their help – or at least their acquiescence – in mining the ore. A beautiful Na'vi female, Neytiri, saves Jake's life, albeit reluctantly, because even in his avatar body, Jake represents to her the human encroachment on the Na'vi's unspoiled world.

As Jake's relationship with Neytiri deepens, along with his respect for the Na'vi, he faces the ultimate test as he leads an epic conflict that will decide nothing less than the fate of an entire world.

[MacGuffin]

Early peek at 'Avatar' production design
Hollywood Award honoree Rick Carter gets candid
Source: variety

James Cameron's megabudget sci-fi spectacle "Avatar" is one of the most anticipated films of the year. The road to its upcoming December release has been filled with artistic, financial and creative obstacles. For production designer Rick Carter, the big challenge was getting inside Cameron's head.

Working on "Avatar," Carter had to envision the planet Pandora in detail.

"It was literally as if Jim had been to this place," says Carter, a Hollywood Award honoree for production design. "He was coming back with fragments and glimpses he could express to us, but then we had to try to figure out how to make that come alive for him and something we felt an audience could relate to."

"Avatar" tells the story of an extreme rehabilitation program: In an attempt to walk again, a paraplegic former Marine named Jake travels to the jungles of the extraterrestrial realm called Pandora, home of the Na'vi, a technologically primitive but physically superior race.

To picture Pandora, Carter created what he calls a "lush homegrown forest that's way overscale for anything we've ever experienced, but also has enough alien qualities that you realize what you're seeing is not just a few flowers poked into the midst of an otherwise normal environment. The essence of it is very different."

At night, the forests of Pandora light up like a psychedelic black-light poster. Cameron's inspiration for that, Carter believes, came from his deep-sea diving experiences.

"The whole idea of (that) bioluminescent world at night is something he'd actually witnessed when he was down at the bottom of the ocean during his 'Titanic' time," Carter says. "That bioluminescence is almost like a nervous system of the planet, and that's what's at stake in the movie, as you start to get past the initial foray into the Na'vi culture and seeing the drama start to emerge between the military-industrial complex that wants to exploit the world."

In order to breathe on Pandora, humans have created human-alien hybrids (the eponymous avatars), and it's through one of these creatures that Jake is able to walk again. But will he remain human or go native after he falls in love with one of the locals, a girl named Neytiri? Intergalactic peace depends on it.

What spells success for "Avatar," however, is good old human identification. "The real challenge is whether you feel the emotion coming through from the characters, especially the Neytiri character and ultimately Jake's avatar," says Carter. "When you look into those eyes, do you feel the connection's real? And then, can you give yourself over to it and not look at it at arm's distance and think, 'Yes, that's wonderful technically, but I don't really feel anything.' "

For Carter, "Avatar" is a movie "where the form and the content come together. We can really relate to the digital imagery in a way that not only suspends our disbelief but invites us to be immersed in this new world."

Definitely, "the medium has evolved," says Carter, looking back at his first production-designer gig, on Hal Ashby's "Second Hand Hearts," in 1981. "And with the introduction of all the digital imagery, there's been a whole new ability to create worlds far beyond what it was when I started."

Carter was also there on "Back to the Future" II & III, "Jurassic Park" and "Forrest Gump," among others, and he's moved into worlds where it's all digital and there's motion capture, he says. Along the way, Carter has "found it very interesting to tap into some of the visual effects designers who are coming from the other side of the equation, the post-production, bringing them forward. The two of us collaborate from the beginning on the look of the movie, especially with things that have never been done before."

Carter uses the words "us" and "we" a lot when he talks about his film work. On "Polar Express," he brought on Doug Chang, a visual effects designer. On "Avatar," which Carter calls "a hybrid movie comprisedof live action and motion capture," he turned to Bob Stromberg.

"Bob had been instrumental in the design of much of the ecosystem of the planet Pandora. It just seemed natural to have him share credit. So it's unusual," Carter says of his penchant for collaboration, "but I see it as a way to move into these films. We used to joke we're creating the airplane in flight, because we're actually making the movie but we don't even know the road we're on to create the movie until you do it."

Recently, Cameron told his "Avatar" production designer, "I'm the one who could pose the question, but it took everybody to collaborate, to come together and find the answers."

"He'd never said that before," says Carter, "I just thought I'd leave you with that."

[cine]

i can't believe how bad this will bomb at the box office.

anyone wanna predict how bad it'll do?

[picolas]

i think it'll make exactly as much as snakes on a plane.  i say this because only people who used the internet for movie news were excited about it. and for avatar it's a few more people but amongst those people there's still some division. so that comes toooo..... $34,014,398.

still. that's 68x better than Delgo.