James Gray Says He Turned Down ‘Goodwill Hunting’ & Explains Why He’d Be Interested In Doing A ‘Batman’ Film

While theaters are still recovering from the pandemic directly impacting attendance and box office outcomes, there are still really great movies struggling to find audiences outside of streaming and VOD options when they are released in theaters. Some smaller to mid-range pictures, mainly horror, have done better than expected in the shadow of the $100-200 million-dollar budgeted blockbusters that seemingly come out round-year now.

Many details have been coming out about the making of “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” this week. Director Ryan Coogler has slowly been revealing details about the original version of the screenplay written before Chadwick Boseman‘s died—a version he was sadly too sick to read and never got the chance to do so.

Avatar: The Way of Water‘s mega-publicized opening has brought movies back into the conversation, but movie-makers seem to have been lost in the mist. James Cameron’s persona is ablaze across the media but, by contrast, the very personal work of Sam Mendes, James Gray and even Steven Spielberg has done a fade-out in recent weeks.

It’s no secret that James Cameron wants the world of Pandora in his “Avatar” franchise to look as realistic as possible. But it’s not all about digital verisimilitude for the director; it’s a practical feature in casting, too.

More than a year ago, Matt Damon was at the Cannes Film Festival talking to an audience, and the actor shared an embarrassing story. He revealed that James Cameron called him up and offered him the lead in “Avatar,” and the filmmaker even offered him a lucrative deal worth 10% of the film’s profits if he would do it.

James Cameron’s epic “Avatar: The Way Of Water” film is in theaters now, and it grossed $430 million this weekend globally—the second-highest global opening of 2022 after “Doctor Strange And The Multiverse of Madness.” There’s been talk that this is a low figure, or disappointing or whatever—to be fair, the film was tracking to anywhere as high as $170 million domestic, and the film only grossed $134 million in North America, which is a bit soft—one has to remember the context of a lot of December releases which tend to have a slow build.

Call it the COVID effect: 2022 has been a year of directors returning to their past and reinterrogating it. Alongside prominent works of autofiction like James Gray’s “Armageddon Time” or Steven Spielberg’s “The Fabelmans,” there’s a less conventional but no less revelatory work that also emerged this year: Mark Pellington’s “Going All the Way: The Director’s Edit.” Note the semantics of the title.

James Cameron likes his female heroines as strong and capable as possible. For instance, take Sigourney Weaver‘s Ellen Ripley in “Aliens” or Linda Hamilton‘s Sarah Connor in “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.” But according to Cameron, Kate Winslet‘s Ronal in “Avatar: The Way Of Water” is the director’s most “empowering” female action hero yet.

An offer he could nearly refuse? Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were eager to ask Tyler Perry to serve as their daughter Lilibet’s godparent, but the Madea star was initially wary about accepting the role.

Well, it’s been a bombshell night in the world of DC Studios and the DC Universe. After telling fans, “we know we are not going to make every single person happy every step of the way,” in response to rumors that “Wonder Woman 3” was being killed and “Man Of Steel 2” may not happen, DC Studios co-chief James Gunn revealed dropped some of his plans and dropped the hammer.

Every director brings a piece of themselves to their work, but this Oscar season has seen films becoming ever more personal. And it’s up to the cinematographer to work with their director to bring those stories to life. 

DC Studios co-head James Gunn is back on Twitter replying to fans and this time he is talking about Superman. The tweets come after news broke that Patty Jenkin’s version of Wonder Woman 3 was not moving forward and that Henry Cavill’s reprisal of the Man of Steel might not be happening.

Last week, critics were able to experience James Cameron’s “Avatar: The Way of Water,” and many of them raved. Cameron spent over a decade putting the film together, along with developing three other installments all at the same time.

DC Studios Chief James Gunn took to Twitter to commemorate the 44th anniversary of Richard Donner’s classic “Superman: The Movie” and reiterated to fans that “Superman is a huge priority, if not the biggest priority.”Now that Gunn is overseeing and planning the next decade of DC Studios movies, a fan asked him if they were going to see a Superman.His response: “Yes of course. Superman is a huge priority, if not the biggest priority.”Yes of course.

It seems somehow surprising that Oscar-winning filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu and lauded veteran cinematographer Darius Khondji had never worked together before collaborating on Bardo, False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths. But when they finally did come together on what would become Mexico’s entry for the Best International Feature Oscar, there was an instant melding of the minds and a true feeling of kinship, with each telling me they felt as if they’d discovered a brother they’d never met.

James Cameron isn’t shy about voicing his opinions, though they may be slightly arrogant. But after making some of the most commercially successful films of all time, it makes sense that Cameron comes off as a little smug.

For Avatar: The Way of Water filmmaker James Cameron, making a sequel to the world’s highest-grossing movie ever was “not a no-brainer” with the original 2009 movie providing “a lot to live up to.”  

This December, after a long, 13-year absence from screens, audiences will finally be able to return to Pandora as the long-delayed sequel to “Avatar” is complete. “Avatar: The Way of Water” will explore a new group of Na’vi that rely on the planet’s ocean life.

With the release of “Avatar: The Way of Water” just a couple of weeks away, folks are now starting to look ahead at what comes next for James Cameron’s franchise.

Best Feature“Aftersun”“The Cathedral”“Dos Estaciones”“Everything Everywhere All at Once”“Tár”Best Documentary Feature“All That Breathes” * WINNER“All the Beauty and the Bloodshed” “I Didn’t See You There”“The Territory”“What We Leave Behind”Best International Feature: “Athena”“The Banshees of Inisherin”“Corsage”“Decision to Leave”“Happening” *WINNER“Saint Omer”Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director AwardCharlotte Wells for “Aftersun” Owen Kline for “Funny Pages” Elegance Bratton for “The Inspection” Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic for “Murina” Beth de Araújo for “Soft & Quiet” Jane Schoenbrun for “We’re All Going to the World’s Fair “Best Screenplay: “After Yang,” Kogonada“Armageddon Time,” James Gray“Catherine Called Birdy,” Lena Dunham“Tár,” Todd Field *WINNER“Women Talking,” Sarah Polley, based upon the book by Miriam ToewsOutstanding Lead PerformanceCate Blanchett in “Tár” Danielle Deadwyler in “Till”Dale Dickey in “A Love Song”Colin Farrell in “After Yang” Brendan Fraser in “The Whale” Paul Mescal in “Aftersun”Thandiwe Newton in “God’s Country” Aubrey Plaza in “Emily the Criminal” Taylor Russell in “Bones and All “Michelle Yeoh in “Everything Everywhere All At Once” Outstanding Supporting PerformanceJessie Buckley in “Women Talking” Raúl Castillo in “The Inspection” Hong Chau in “The Whale” Brian Tyree Henry in “Causeway” Nina Hoss in “Tár” Noémie Merlant in “Tár” Ke Huy Quan in “Everything Everywhere All At Once”Mark Rylance in “Bones and All “Gabrielle Union in “The Inspection” Ben Whishaw in “Women Talking”Breakthrough Performer: Anna Cobb in “We’re All Going to the World’s Fair”Frankie Corio in “Aftersun”Anna Diop in “Nanny” Gracija Filipovic in “Murina” *WINNERKalie Reis in “Catch the Fair One”Breakthrough Series –