AVATAR boosts Box-Office.

If the initial reports are anything to go by, James Cameron is repeating the box – office magic of Titanic again, with AVATAR this holiday season. And unlike staple Friday openings, he has the entire holiday season spread out in front of him, promising the windfall. But the figures speak for themselves. Though the box-office opening didn’t rise to the  ‘out-of-the-world’  figures, as was expected,  Fox seems to have been vindicated of the enormous risk it took with the Sci-fi action movie and its director, James Cameron. AVATAR’s weekend collection was around US $ 73 million as it opened across 3,452 theaters in North America, and Fox’s insistence that this is one movie that has to be watched in 3-D has given a new lease of life to the I-max theaters spread over America.

AVATAR’s opening debut according to Box Office Mojo has been “the highest-grossing opening ever for a movie that’s neither a sequel, a remake nor a direct adaptation.” Compared to the last holiday season’s big ticket release, it stands just behind Will Smith’s I am Legend  that raked in US $ 77.2 million in its December opening.

With an estimated US $ 310 pumped into production and new technology for the movie, and an estimated budget of US $ 150 million for worldwide marketing, FOX is keeping its fingers crossed and refusing to blink till the trend stays healthy and mighty. Well, they could take comfort from the fact that in London alone, London’s British Film Institute has sold over $1 million in advance ticket sales for AVATAR at its IMAX theater.

AVATAR also opened in 106 countries worldwide over the weekend and has  brought in  another $164.5 million from 64 markets! This excludes China, Japan and  Italy. So, on a fair note, the opening box –office collection of AVATAR including its home box-office would be around US $ $241.6 million!

And its just the beginning, as they say. James and Fox has the entire holiday season ahead of them make up for the biggest risk they have taken in their professional careers till date. It is not just easy to have a sci-fi movie with characters that are beyond rational thought to establish a ‘emotional relationship’ with the viewer and also have him/ her pick their respective lower jaws from the floor every 5 minutes while watching the movie. Deep down, AVATAR is  a simple movie about love, longing  and greed that towers above it all.

Maybe the Na’vi could teach planet Earth a thing or two about box-office collection too, what say?

Watch the HD trailer of AVATAR here.