«Avatar: The Way of Water» is a 2022 American epic science fiction film and the sequel to the 2009 film «Avatar», both directed by James Cameron.
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- Avatar: The Way of Water is a 2022 American epic science fiction film. It serves as the sequel to the 2009 film Avatar.
- Both of the movies were directed by James Cameron.
- The film is distributed by 20th Century Studios, as the second installment in the Avatar film series.
- James Cameron produced the film with Jon Landau.
- He wrote the screenplay with Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver.
- The screenplay is based on a story the three wrote with Josh Friedman and Shane Salerno.
- Cast members Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Stephen Lang, Joel David Moore, CCH Pounder, Giovanni Ribisi, Dileep Rao, and Matt Gerald reprise their roles from the original film.
- Sigourney Weaver returned in a different role.
- New cast members include Kate Winslet, Cliff Curtis, Edie Falco, Jemaine Clement, and Brendan Cowell.
- Cameron, who had stated in 2006 that he would like to make sequels to Avatar if it was successful, announced the first two sequels in 2010 following the widespread success of the first film, with The Way of Water aiming for a 2014 release.
- However, the addition of three more sequels (for a total of five Avatar films) and the necessity to develop new technology in order to film performance capture scenes underwater, a feat never accomplished before, led to significant delays to allow the crew more time to work on the writing, preproduction, and visual effects.
- Preliminary shooting for the film started in Manhattan Beach, California, on August 15, 2017, followed by principal photography simultaneously with Avatar 3 in Wellington on September 25, 2017.
- Filming concluded in late September 2020.
- The shooting lasted for three years.
- Made on an estimated budget of $350–400 million, it is one of the most expensive films of all time.
- The film’s theatrical release has been subject to repeated delays, with the latest occurring on July 23, 2020.
- The film is set to be released on December 16, 2022, with a further three sequels to arrive in 2024, 2026 and 2028.
- Organizations like the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute named it one of the top ten films of 2022.
- At the 80th Golden Globe Awards, the film received nominations for Best Motion Picture – Drama and Best Director.
- According to James Cameron, the Avatar sequels were such a massive undertaking that he divided the four scripts between the writing team of Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Josh Friedman, and Shane Salerno.
- Cameron delves further explaining the story process: “I think we met for seven months and we whiteboarded out every scene in every film together, and I didn’t assign each writer which film they were going to work on until the last day. I knew if I assigned them their scripts ahead of time, they’d tune out every time we were talking about the other movie.”
- James Cameron seriously considered shooting the entirety of the Avatar sequels in a higher frame rate
- The industry standard is 24fps, and higher frame rates are at least 48fps, 60fps, or 120fps. He later opted out of this route, stating in an interview that as groundbreaking as the format is for cinema, moviegoers have always been used to a specific way to view films and altering that in any way would simply take the audience out of that experience. Instead, only certain scenes will utilize HFR technology.
- James Cameron and Jon Landau confirms that Sony specifically listened to the request of Cameron to build a new camera called “Venice” Camera and Cameron also confirmed that he will shoot Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 (2024) with this Venice Camera.
- According to James Cameron, Kate Winslet will be performing all of her underwater stunts herself.
- The Avatar sequels will cost collectively over $1 billion.
- When the movie finally releases in, supposedly, 2022 there will have been a 13 year gap between the first and second films. Giving it one of the longest development times as it was announced almost immediately following the first film’s success.
- James Horner had signed on to score the film, until his death in June 2015. The new composer is Simon Franglen.
- Edward Norton turned down a role after finding out he’d be playing a human, being more interested in playing a Na’vi. James Cameron, who still wanted to work with Norton, eventually had him cast as Nova in Alitta: Battle Angel (2019).
- Kate Winslet broke Tom Cruise’s underwater filming record from Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015) of six minutes with a record of seven minutes and 14 seconds.
- The release date has been pushed back to 2022. According to James Cameron this is because all upcoming sequels are being filmed ‘back to back’, similar to Peter Jackson’s ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy.
- This sequel was announced in December 2009. Originally, James Cameron wanted to release it in 2015. After that was delayed to December 2016. After that to December 2017. In April 2016, Cameron announced a delay the release to December 2018. In March 2017, Cameron announced that the release finally wouldn’t be in December 2018. In April 27 2017 was announced that the release would be on December 18 2020. In May 2019, Disney announced that the release finally would be on December 17 2021. In July 24 2020, Disney announced it would postpone the film due to the Covid19 pandemic to December 16, 2022.
- When asked why the movies longer at 3 hours, James Cameron revealed in an interview with Total Film: “The goal is to tell an extremely compelling story on an emotional basis, I would say the emphasis in the new film is more on character, more on story, more on relationships, more on emotion. We didn’t spend as much time on relationship and emotion in the first film as we do in the second film, and it’s a longer film, because there’s more characters to service. There’s more story to service.” Above all, however, The Way Of Water is a family story. This is because, 14 years after falling in love, Jake and Neytiri are now the proud parents of five children. “People say, ‘Oh my God, a family story from Disney? Just what we want’ This isn’t that kind of family story,” Cameron clarifies. “This is a family story like how The Sopranos is a family story.”
- On December 17, 2019, via filmmusicreporter.com, it was announced that Simon Franglen would be composing the score to Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 (2024). Fraanglen was originally arranger and score producer on the first movie and had numerous other collaborations with James Horner, who scored the first Avatar (2009), including Titanic (1997).
- The film’s producer Jon Landau revealed that Kate Winslet left production astounded when she managed to nearly hold her breath underwater for seven minutes. Speaking to the Daily Mail, Landau said: “Kate broke a free-diving record among the cast. It was six minutes 50-something — but for Kate we agreed to call it seven. “She was phenomenal.” Bailey Bass, who plays Winslet’s daughter Tsireya in the film, added: “Kate holds the record she set it during training. I managed six minutes and 30 seconds.”
- James Cameron’s first sequel since Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991).
- James Cameron is prepared to end the Avatar series after the third film if Avatar: The Way of Water isn’t profitable, “The question is: how many people give a sh-t now?” he stated.
- Disney’s Animal Kingdom Park in Orlando, Florida, opened Pandora as a themed area in the park on May 27, 2017. It is inspired by James Cameron’s Avatar (2009) and features Pandora’s floating mountains, alien wildlife, and bioluminescent plants. It includes two major attractions, Avatar Flight of Passage and Na’vi River Journey, as well as retail and dining outlets.
- Several creatures introduced in the theme park attraction Avatar Flight of Passage will be featured in the film.
- Discussing the character of Tuk in a February 2019 interview, James Cameron mentioned that she was eight years old, and that the film would feature a scene between Jake and Neytiri taking place from Tuk’s perspective: “There’s a three-page argument scene between Jake and Neytiri, a marital dispute, very, very critical to the storyline. I wound up shooting it all from the point of view of the 8-year-old hiding under the structure and peeking in. Having gone through the experience with [Sam Worthington] on Avatar, I now knew how to write the Jake character going forward across the emotional rollercoaster of the next four movies.”
- In a December 2019 interview, Stephen Lang stated that his character was always meant to return in the sequels, as James Cameron had shared with him “that Quaritch had a future” while shooting the original film.
- This movie is set to be released 13 years after the original Avatar (2009).
- Kirk Krack, founder of Performance Freediving International, worked as a free-diving trainer for the cast and crew for the underwater scenes
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