‘Avatar: The Way Of Water’ Has Best Wednesday Of 2022 With $20.4M – Domestic Box Office

Refresh for latest…: That was fast. Coming out of its fourth weekend of release, James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water has topped $1.7B globally and become the No. 7 biggest movie of all time worldwide.

As soon as James Cameron and 20th Century Fox announced four more “Avatar” films following the juggernaut success of the original movie, naysayers immediately doubted audiences’ appetite for more. But as usual, Cameron has proved the skeptics wrong.

James Cameron believes Avatar: The Way of Water will break even, and is confident Disney will proceed with the sequels.

As we detailed extensively in our Biggest Entertainment Stories Of 2022 & What’s Next feature from late last year, while riding high for years and seemingly the future of the film and television industry, the bubble burst on streaming last year. The shortest version of that story? Netflix stock tumbled in early 2022, and then in April, the streamer announced it had lost subscribers for the first time in more than a decade, its stock plunged heavily, and the company quickly scrambled to go to an ad-model-tier subscription model.

BAFTA has unveiled the longlists across all categories for its 2023 Film Awards, and Martin McDonagh’s tragicomedy The Banshees Of Inisherin and Netflix’s All Quiet on the Western Front lead. Scroll down for the lists in full.

Slow and steady wins the race, especially if you’re James Cameron and the world always seems to be skeptical about your chances. It’s been said never to bet against Cameron.

As “Avatar: The Way Of Water” continues to soar at the box office, the adage “don’t bet against James Cameron” proves correct. The first sequel to Cameron’s 2009 smash hit likely crosses the $1.5 billion gross barrier today.

They are known as the peaceful inhabitants of Pandora.But director James Cameron is preparing to show a different side of the Na'vi community in the next Avatar sequel.  Speaking with the French outlet 20 Minutes, Cameron, 68, described his intentions to introduce new communities to the franchise and showcase a darker side of the Na'vi. 'I want to show the Na'vi from another angle': Director James Cameron is preparing to show a different side of the Na'vi community in the next Avatar sequelThe next film will show 'different cultures from those I have already shown,' Cameron told the outlet, according to Total Film.'The fire will be represented by the "Ash People." I want to show the Na'vi from another angle because, so far, I have only shown their good sides,' he explained.

James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water has now officially, and as projected, crossed the $1 billion mark at the international box office with Tuesday’s grosses included. What’s more for this 20th Century Studios/Disney juggernaut, at $1,482.5M worldwide through Tuesday, the epic sci-fi sequel is next on its way to yet another milestone and will top $1.5B global when today’s numbers are factored. In doing so, it will become the No. 1 worldwide release of 2022, surpassing Top Gun: Maverick’s $1.489B.

Before the release of “Avatar: The Way of Water,” James Cameron made a lot of headlines after declaring his new film would need to be one of the Top 5 highest-grossing films of all time just to break even. Many took that quote and extrapolated that Cameron wanted ‘The Way of Water’ to hit $2 billion to become profitable during its theatrical run.

French cinemas amassed nearly 152 million admissions in 2022, new data from the National Cinema Center (CNC) shows. That’s an estimated 26.9% off the pre-pandemic three-year average (2017-2019), and an estimated 59.2% hike on 2021 which endured 138 days of movie theater closures. France reports its box office in terms of admissions, however, the total for the year is expected to exceed $1 billion.

China’s box office in 2022 dropped 36% versus 2021, reaching approximately RMB 30B ($4.35B). According to China.org, citing figures from the China Film Administration, 85% of the 2022 revenue was generated by local movies, led by The Battle at Lake Changjin II with RMB 4.07B ($636M at historical rates, per comScore). This past weekend, James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water became the highest-grossing studio import of the year, overtaking Jurassic World Dominion with an estimated $152.8M through Sunday.

Refresh for latest…: James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water rang in the New Year with another $186.7M from 52 international markets for a $1.379B global cume to date. Excluding China, the film rose 4% from last weekend’s Christmas frame offshore (including China it was even with last session). The international box office now stands at an estimated $957M, meaning Way of Water will cross $1B overseas early this week. 

SUNDAY AM, NEW YEAR’S DAY: Refresh for more analysis and chart While New Year’s Eve is typically a better moviegoing day than Christmas Eve, business was still down yesterday at -27% from Friday for all movies. That’s a similar decline to last weekend’s Friday-to-Christmas Eve (-26%), however New Year’s Eve made more than Christmas Eve, $27.9M to $22.2M. Moviegoing is expected to be +19% on New Year’s Day, and there will be an extra cushion in Monday, Jan. 2 as many typically have off in honor of the Sunday holiday. Per our sources, weather wasn’t an issue this weekend.

It was another $20M day for James Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water, so big that it was the biggest regular box office Thursday of the year after the sequel’s Dec. 22 take of $14.6M and Top Gun: Maverick‘s June 2 gross. The movie’s running total is $358M stateside with a 3-day expected to be around $50M and will cross the $400M threshold on New Year’s Day per box office sources. New Year’s Eve Saturday isn’t expected to be as depressed as Christmas Eve was a week ago.

James Cameron's work as a writer and director of such films as Titanic (1997), Avatar (2009), The Abyss (1989), Aliens (1986) and Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991) has left an indelible mark on the moviemaking industry.In most cases his epics are some of the most expensive and longest running films with no shortage of action.While his latest grand adventure Avatar: The Way of Water runs 192 minutes (3 hours and 12 minutes), this go around he actually decided to shorten the runtime, in part, as to not 'fetishize' gun violence. Avoiding gratuitous violence: James Cameron, 68, revealed that he cut out 10 minutes from Avatar: The Way Of Water that he deemed unnecessary in order to 'not fetishize the gun, like I did on a couple of Terminator movies 30+ years ago' 'I actually cut about 10 minutes of the movie targeting gunplay action,' Cameron told Esquire Middle East, as reported by Huff Post. 'I wanted to get rid of some of the ugliness, to find a balance between light and dark.

Director James Cameron’s Avatar 3 is already in post-production and parts of Avatar 4 have already been filmed. That’s while he’s doing promotional duty with the December release of Avatar: The Way of Water, the sequel to the original film.

After two weeks in theaters, James Cameron‘s “Avatar: The Way Of Water” passed $1.1 billion at the global box office. A strong start, but will it reach Cameron’s desired gross of matching or surpassing the 2009 film’s 2.923 billion gross? Only time will tell.

Kim Kardashian and daughter North West took to TikTok on Wednesday to upload a new clip with an Avatar filter.The 42-year-old mogul and her nine-year-old mini me were covered in blue, as well as face-warping effects in the seconds-long clip.It comes as the James Cameron-directed film recently passed $1 billion at the box office. Cute post: Kim Kardashian and daughter North West took to TikTok on Wednesday to upload a new clip with an Avatar filter Kardashian and West sat side-by-side on a couch at their Calabasas abode to create the video.Kim, who recently ditched her platinum blonde color to go back to her dark tresses, wore her hair in a center part and low, loose ponytail.  North rocked long, chunky individual braids throughout her head as she clung close to her mom's shoulder.The snippet was soundtracked to tribal-sounding music from the film and the two took turns slowly moving their hands across the screen.  Quality time: The 42-year-old mogul and her nine-year-old mini me were covered in blue, as well as face-warping effects in the seconds-long clipAvatar's sequel, The Way Of Water, crossed the $1billion mark on Tuesday night, just 13 days after its global release.Deadline reported on Tuesday morning that the movie had already made over $900million over Christmas weekend.And the film picked up even more steam on Monday, also known as Boxing Day, as some people had off from work.The movie claimed the top spot for the second straight week in a row with $19.5 million grossed over the holiday weekend.