Introduction to Avatar

In 2148, the Earth's natural resources have been severely depleted. A starship named the Venture Star leaves Earth bound for a journey into deep space, with a crew of cryogenic men on board. 6 years later, in 2154, the RDA Corporation is mining a valuable mineral called unobtanium on Pandora, a lush, Earth-like habitable moon orbiting the gas giant Polyphemus located in the Alpha Centauri star system. Pandora, whose atmosphere is poisonous to humans, is inhabited by the Na'vi, 10-foot-tall, blue-skinned, sapient humanoids who live in harmony with nature and worship a mother goddess called Eywa.

How the of idea of Avatar started

In 1994, director James Cameron wrote an 80-page scriptment for Avatar. In August 1996, he announced that after completing Titanic, he would film Avatar, which would make use of synthetic, or computer-generated, actors. The project would cost $100 million and involve at least six actors in leading roles "who appear to be real but do not exist in the physical world". Visual effects house Digital Domain, with whom Cameron has a partnership, joined the project, which was supposed to begin production in the summer of 1997 for a 1999 release. However, Cameron felt that the technology had not caught up with the story and vision that he intended to tell. He decided to concentrate on making documentaries and refining the technology for the next few years.

Box Office Gross

On January 31 it became the first film to earn over $2 billion. By the end of its first theatrical release Avatar had grossed $749,766,139 in Canada and the U.S., and $1,990,639,582 in other territories, for a worldwide total of $2,740,405,721.

Sequels

In an August 2010 interview, Cameron stated that his plans are to shoot both sequels in the planned trilogy back-to-back and that he was waiting for deals to be made. He also mentioned, "what I'm working on primarily is the novel" and "presumably, once the novel is nailed down, work will begin in earnest on getting the sequel going. In October 2010, Cameron officially signed an agreement with Fox to direct two sequels to Avatar, which are scheduled to be released in December 2014 and December 2015. Both sequels will be produced by Cameron's own Lightstorm Entertainment in partnership with 20th Century Fox.