Why do I have an uneasy feeling that there will be “making of” featurette about the mission that will have Bill Paxton’s ugly mug emoting awe and wonder all over the inside of the vessel? Even if he isn’t actually in Avatar 2.
The Avatar hook on the OP’s link seems kinda forced. All it says is that Cameron may use some of the footage in his next film. I can’t imagine the films studio is funding such an expensive and dangerous project to get footage of mud and rare flounder that may get used in the film, it seems pretty clear this is just a personal project of Cameron’s that doesn’t really have any connection to his Avatar movies, but either he, the reporter or a PR flack through in the Avatar angle to make the story more interesting for people who are interested in entertainment news but not deep sea exploration (or the vanity projects of rich directors).
Before reading the article, I developed the vague hope that the sequel would take the concept of using teleoperated avatars to a different world than Pandora, perhaps even to the oceans of our own Earth.
Something having a wikipedia page means that it has a significantly large fanbase to have gotten it a wikipedia page - no more, no less. Googling “list of accolades received by” comes up with 44,600 hits.
Yeah, I’ve seen documentaries about the deep ocean bottom and, while the individual worms and urchins might be kind of nifty, the scenery isn’t exactly something you couldn’t replicate with a computer pretty easily. I don’t see much point in it and wouldn’t personally consider it a draw for me.
I agree. Avatar was an enjoyable and entertaining movie. It wasn’t the greatest movie ever made but it was certainly a good movie. It fit perfectly into Cameron’s genre - big entertaining movies with great visuals.
The same thing happened to Titanic - ridiculously popular, acclaimed movie with over-the-top hype receives over-the-top backlash.
I was there once. For about 5 minutes. A few decades ago. Then she called the cops on me. Fortunately I was using a fake ID and my DNA isnt in any database.
At least a Titanic sequel set at the bottom of the ocean has some interesting possibilities.
Cameron’s already made The Abyss, which I love. AND I think it covers just about everything except ongoing interaction between species. Not sure where else to go with it, except into more war.
Maybe the butterfly-water-people from Abyss will meet up with the Navi and we can have more cool underwater flying scenes or something.
Of course he is. Cameron readily admits that he uses movie making to indulge his other hobbies. He made Titanic in large part because he wanted to explore the wreck, so he came up with the movie idea to get the film studio to pay forthe expedition and to pay him to do it to boot. Good gig if you can get it. He’s doing exactly the same thing with Avatar 2 - he’s already said that he wanted to explore the Marianas trench, but he needed to come up with a way to work it into a movie so he could afford to do it.
Using movies to indulge his geek side is one of the things I like about him.
I heard that for part 3 he’s literally going to Pandora to get some location shots.
I think it’s pretty cool, and the best part is that he’s getting the studios to pay for him to play. I’m guessing there will be little or nothing actually used from the shoot down there, but he might use it as a model for his virtual world simulations. Regardless, I’m up for another movie or two. It will be interesting to see where he goes with the story.
-XT
James Cameron has two passions - making epic effects-driven movies, and deep sea exploration. He has combined the two many times, so this is hardly even news.
I doubt he’ll use footage of the trip in Avatar 2, but he may be inspired by what he finds there, just as many of the creatures and environments of the first came from what he’d seen on his other underwater journeys.
The plot wasn’t horrible. Just very mediocre. Cameron knew what he was doing every step of the way - getting a return on the $300 million the studio invested into this film, so that he can play with another $300 million for his next film.
The plot of Avatar 2 won’t be spectacular, but I can guarantee the special effects will be. I don’t see why Cameron inspires so much hate for that.
Would you kindly just make a movie of BioShock, Mr. Cameron? 
Cisco beat me to the quote. :smack:
Cameron has done plenty of deep sea documentary stuff, so I could see this being another example of that. I don’t really see the point of it for Avatar 2, despite reports that it will feature a lot of underwater stuff. Is there anything visually remarkable about the trench that you couldn’t find on the conventional ocean bottom or shallower trenches?
Worse yet, he has a three-movie prequel arc …
Or so I assume. What else could be worse yet?
Underwater flying?
Isn’t that just, you know, swimming?
The thing I like about Cameron is that he does real engineering. Not just movie props and special effects, but honest to goodness innovations in exploration and movie making technology.
The guy’s got four honorary doctorates, a bunch of Academy awards and nominations, he’s the most powerful man in Hollywood, and he operates his own fleet of the best deep sea submarines in the world. He designs Mars missions for NASA and sits on the board of the Mars Surface Laboratory at JPL. He’s like a character in a James Bond movie. You’ve gotta love that.
When I go to see a $300 million dollar movie, I’m expecting they will have ponied up a bit of that budget for a decent screenplay. I don’t understand the defenders of this movie’s attitude of ‘but look how pretty it is!’. Movies are about story-telling. Cameron as much as anyone knows this.