Thursday, Dec. 09, 2010
$2.7 billion
Amount Avatar earned worldwide at the box office
James Cameron literally reinvented the way Hollywood makes movies in late 2009 when he released Avatar, a film more than a decade in the making. Just as important, he changed the way we watch movies. The stunning visuals of his 3-D extravaganza mesmerized moviegoers and raked in close to $3 billion worldwide. The film was nominated for nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It also unleashed an endless number of 3-D movies (some stunning, though the ones not actually filmed in 3-D were often disappointing) and stirred interest in the possibilities of three-dimensional viewing at home. Avatar now holds the U.S. and global box-office records, having surpassed Cameron's Titanic.