Critical response
On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, 82% of 337 reviews are positive, and the average rating is 7.5/10. The site's consensus reads: "It might be more impressive on a technical level than as a piece of storytelling, but Avatar reaffirms James Cameron's singular gift for imaginative, absorbing filmmaking."[205] On Metacritic—which assigns a weighted mean score—the film has a score of 83 out of 100 based on 38 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[206] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale. Every demographic surveyed was reported to give this rating. These polls also indicated that the main draw of the film was its use of 3D.[207]
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times called the film "extraordinary", and gave it four stars out of four. "Watching Avatar, I felt sort of the same as when I saw Star Wars in 1977," he said, adding that like Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, the film "employs a new generation of special effects" and it "is not simply a sensational entertainment, although it is that. It's a technical breakthrough. It has a flat-out Green and anti-war message".[208] A. O. Scott of At The Movies also compared his viewing of the film to the first time he viewed Star Wars and he said "although the script is a little bit ... obvious," it was "part of what made it work".[209][210] Todd McCarthy of Variety praised the film, saying: "The King of the World sets his sights on creating another world entirely in Avatar, and it's very much a place worth visiting."[211] Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter gave the film a positive review. "The screen is alive with more action and the soundtrack pops with more robust music than any dozen sci-fi shoot-'em-ups you care to mention," he stated.[212] Peter Travers of Rolling Stone awarded Avatar a three-and-a-half out of four star rating, and wrote in his print review: "It extends the possibilities of what movies can do. Cameron's talent may just be as big as his dreams."[213] Richard Corliss of Time thought that the film was "the most vivid and convincing creation of a fantasy world ever seen in the history of moving pictures."[214] Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times thought the film has "powerful" visual accomplishments but "flat dialogue" and "obvious characterization".[215] James Berardinelli of ReelViews praised the film and its story, giving it four out of four stars. He wrote: "In 3-D, it's immersive – but the traditional film elements – story, character, editing, theme, emotional resonance, etc. – are presented with sufficient expertise to make even the 2-D version an engrossing 2+1⁄2-hour experience."[216]
Avatar's underlying social and political themes attracted attention. Armond White of the New York Press wrote that Cameron used "villainous American characters" to "misrepresent facets of militarism, capitalism, and imperialism".[217][218] Russell D. Moore of The Christian Post concluded that "propaganda exists in the film" and stated "If you can get a theater full of people in Kentucky to stand and applaud the defeat of their country in war, then you've got some amazing special effects."[219] Adam Cohen of The New York Times was more positive about the film, calling its anti-imperialist message "a 22nd-century version of the American colonists vs. the British, India vs. the Raj, or Latin America vs. United Fruit".[220] Ross Douthat of The New York Times opined that the film is "Cameron's long apologia for pantheism [...] Hollywood's religion of choice for a generation now",[221] while Saritha Prabhu of The Tennessean called the film a "misportrayal of pantheism and Eastern spirituality in general",[222] and Maxim Osipov of The Hindustan Times, on the contrary, commended the film's message for its overall consistency with the teachings of Hinduism in the Bhagavad Gita.[223] Annalee Newitz of io9 concluded that Avatar is another film that has the recurring "fantasy about race" whereby "some white guy" becomes the "most awesome" member of a non-white culture.[224] Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune called Avatar "the season's ideological Rorschach blot",[225] while Miranda Devine of The Sydney Morning Herald thought that "It [was] impossible to watch Avatar without being banged over the head with the director's ideological hammer."[226] Nidesh Lawtoo believed that an essential, yet less visible social theme that contributed to Avatar's success concerns contemporary fascinations with virtual avatars and "the transition from the world of reality to that of virtual reality".[227]
Critics and audiences have cited similarities with other films, literature or media, describing the perceived connections in ways ranging from simple "borrowing" to outright plagiarism. Ty Burr of The Boston Globe called it "the same movie" as Dances with Wolves.[228] Like Dances with Wolves, Avatar has been characterized as being a "white savior" movie, in which a "backwards" native people is impotent without the leadership of a member of the invading white culture.[229][230] Parallels to the concept and use of an avatar are in Poul Anderson's 1957 novelette "Call Me Joe", in which a paralyzed man uses his mind from orbit to control an artificial body on Jupiter.[231][232] Cinema audiences in Russia have noted that Avatar has elements in common with the 1960s Noon Universe novels by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, which are set in the 22nd century on a forested world called Pandora with a sentient indigenous species called the Nave.[233] Various reviews have compared Avatar to the films FernGully: The Last Rainforest,[234][235] Pocahontas[236] and The Last Samurai.[237] NPR's Morning Edition has compared the film to a montage of tropes, with one commentator stating that Avatar was made by "mixing a bunch of film scripts in a blender".[238] Gary Westfahl wrote that "the science fiction story that most closely resembles Avatar has to be Ursula Le Guin's novella The Word for World Is Forest (1972), another epic about a benevolent race of alien beings who happily inhabit dense forests while living in harmony with nature until they are attacked and slaughtered by invading human soldiers who believe that the only good gook is a dead gook".[232] The science fiction writer and editor Gardner Dozois said that along with the Anderson and Le Guin stories, the "mash-up" included Alan Dean Foster's 1975 novel, Midworld.[239] Some sources saw similarities to the artwork of Roger Dean, which features fantastic images of dragons and floating rock formations.[240][241] In 2013, Dean sued Cameron and Fox, claiming that Pandora was inspired by 14 of his images. Dean sought damages of $50m.[242] Dean's case was dismissed in 2014, and The Hollywood Reporter noted that Cameron had won multiple Avatar idea theft cases.[243]
Avatar received compliments from filmmakers, with Steven Spielberg praising it as "the most evocative and amazing science-fiction movie since Star Wars" and others calling it "audacious and awe inspiring", "master class", and "brilliant". Noted art director-turned-filmmaker Roger Christian is also a noted fan of the film.[244] On the other hand, Duncan Jones said: "It's not in my top three James Cameron films. ... [A]t what point in the film did you have any doubt what was going to happen next?".[245] For French filmmaker Luc Besson, Avatar opened the doors for him to now create an adaptation of the graphic novel series Valérian and Laureline that technologically supports the scope of its source material, with Besson even throwing his original script in the trash and redoing it after seeing the film.[246] TIME ranked Avatar number 3 in their list of "The 10 Greatest Movies of the Millennium (Thus Far)"[247] also earning it a spot on the magazine's All-Time 100 list,[248] and IGN listed Avatar as number 22 on their list of the top 25 Sci-Fi movies of all time.[249]
Box office
General
Avatar was released internationally on more than 14,000 screens.[250] It grossed $3,537,000 from midnight screenings in the United States and Canada, with the initial 3D release limited to 2,200 screens.[251] The film grossed $26,752,099 on its opening day, and $77,025,481 over its opening weekend, making it the second-largest December opening ever behind I Am Legend,[22][5] the largest domestic opening weekend for a film not based on a franchise (topping The Incredibles), the highest opening weekend for a film entirely in 3D (breaking Up's record),[252] the highest opening weekend for an environmentalist film (breaking The Day After Tomorrow's record),[253] and the 40th-largest opening weekend in North America,[5] despite a blizzard that blanketed the East Coast of the United States and reportedly hurt its opening weekend results.[17][22][23] The film also set an IMAX opening weekend record, with 178 theaters generating approximately $9.5 million, 12% of the film's $77 million (at the time) North American gross on less than 3% of the screens.[172]
International markets generating opening weekend tallies of at least $10 million were for Russia ($19.7 million), France ($17.4 million), the UK ($13.8 million), Germany ($13.3 million), South Korea ($11.7 million), Australia ($11.5 million), and Spain ($11.0 million).[5] Avatar's worldwide gross was US$241.6 million after five days, the ninth largest opening-weekend gross of all time, and the largest for a non-franchise, non-sequel and original film.[254] 58 international IMAX screens generated an estimated $4.1 million during the opening weekend.[172]
Revenues in the film's second weekend decreased by only 1.8% in domestic markets, marking a rare occurrence,[255] grossing $75,617,183, to remain in first place at the box office[256] and recording what was then the biggest second weekend of all time.[257] The film experienced another marginal decrease in revenue in its third weekend, dropping 9.4% to $68,490,688 domestically, remaining in first place at the box office,[258] to set a third-weekend record.[259]
Avatar crossed the $1 billion mark on the 19th day of its international release, making it the first film to reach this mark in only 19 days.[260] It became the fifth film grossing more than $1 billion worldwide, and the only film of 2009 to do so.[261] In its fourth weekend, Avatar continued to lead the box office domestically, setting a new all-time fourth-weekend record of $50,306,217,[262] and becoming the highest-grossing 2009 release in the United States, beating Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.[255] In the film's fifth weekend, it set the Martin Luther King Day weekend record, grossing $54,401,446,[263] and set a fifth-weekend record with a take of $42,785,612.[264] It held the top spot to set the sixth and seventh weekend records grossing $34,944,081[265] and $31,280,029[266] respectively. It was the fastest film to gross $600 million domestically, on its 47th day in theaters.[267]
On January 31, it became the first film to gross over $2 billion worldwide,[268] and it became the first film to gross over $700 million in the U.S. and Canada, on February 27, after 72 days of release.[269] It remained at number one at the domestic box office for seven consecutive weeks – the most consecutive No. 1 weekends since Titanic spent 15 weekends at No.1 in 1997 and 1998[270] – and also spent 11 consecutive weekends at the top of the box office outside the United States and Canada, breaking the record of nine consecutive weekends set by Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.[271] By the end of its first theatrical release Avatar had grossed $749,766,139 in the U.S. and Canada, and $1,999,298,189 in other territories, for a worldwide total of $2,749,064,328.[5]
Including the revenue from a re-release of Avatar featuring extended footage, Avatar grossed $785,221,649 in the U.S. and Canada, and $2,137,696,265 in other countries for a worldwide total of $2,922,917,914.[5] Avatar has set a number of box office records during its release: on January 25, 2010, it surpassed Titanic's worldwide gross to become the highest-grossing film of all time worldwide 41 days after its international release,[272][273][274] just two days after taking the foreign box office record.[275] On February 2, 47 days after its domestic release, Avatar surpassed Titanic to become the highest-grossing film of all time in Canada and the United States.[276] It became the highest-grossing film of all time in at least 30 other countries[277][278][279][280][281][282] and is the first film to gross over $2 billion in foreign box office receipts.[283] IMAX ticket sales account for $243.3 million of its worldwide gross,[284] more than double the previous record.[285] By 2022, this figure rose to $268.6 million.[286]
Box Office Mojo estimates that after adjusting for the rise in average ticket prices, Avatar would be the 14th-highest-grossing film of all time in North America.[287] Box Office Mojo also observes that the higher ticket prices for 3D and IMAX screenings have had a significant impact on Avatar's gross; it estimated, on April 21, 2010, that Avatar had sold approximately 75 million tickets in North American theaters, more than any other film since 1999's Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace.[288] On a worldwide basis, when Avatar's gross stood at $2 billion just 35 days into its run, The Daily Telegraph estimated its gross was surpassed by only Gone with the Wind ($3.0 billion), Titanic ($2.9 billion), and Star Wars ($2.2 billion) after adjusting for inflation to 2010 prices,[289] with Avatar ultimately winding up with $2.92 billion after subsequent re-releases.[5] Reuters even placed it ahead of Titanic after adjusting the global total for inflation.[290] The 2015 edition of Guinness World Records lists Avatar only behind Gone with the Wind in terms of adjusted grosses worldwide.[291][292]
Commercial analysis
Before its release, various film critics and fan communities predicted the film would be a significant disappointment at the box office, in line with predictions made for Cameron's previous blockbuster Titanic.[293][294][295] This criticism ranged from Avatar's film budget, to its concept and use of 3-D "blue cat people".[293][294] Slate magazine's Daniel Engber complimented the 3D effects but criticized them for reminding him of certain CGI characters from the Star Wars prequel films and for having the "uncanny valley" effect.[296] The New York Times noted that 20th Century Fox executives had decided to release Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel alongside Avatar, calling it a "secret weapon" to cover any unforeseeable losses at the box office.[297]
I think if everybody was embracing the film before the fact, the film could never live up to that expectation ... Have them go with some sense of wanting to find the answer.
James Cameron on criticism of Avatar before its release.[294]
Box office analysts, on the other hand, estimated that the film would be a box office success.[293][298] "The holy grail of 3-D has finally arrived," said an analyst for Exhibitor Relations. "This is why all these 3-D venues were built: for Avatar. This is the one. The behemoth."[298] The "cautionary estimate" was that Avatar would bring in around $60 million in its opening weekend. Others guessed higher.[298][299] There were also analysts who believed that the film's three-dimensionality would help its box office performance, given that recent 3D films had been successful.[293]
Cameron said he felt the pressure of the predictions, but that pressure is good for film-makers. "It makes us think about our audiences and what the audience wants," he stated. "We owe them a good time. We owe them a piece of good entertainment."[294] Although he felt Avatar would appeal to everyone and that the film could not afford to have a target demographic,[294] he especially wanted hard-core science-fiction fans to see it: "If I can just get 'em in the damn theater, the film will act on them in the way it's supposed to, in terms of taking them on an amazing journey and giving them this rich emotional experience."[300] Cameron was aware of the sentiment that Avatar would need significant "repeat business" just to make up for its budget and achieve box office success, and believed Avatar could inspire the same "sharing" reaction as Titanic. He said that film worked because, "When people have an experience that's very powerful in the movie theatre, they want to go share it. They want to grab their friend and bring them, so that they can enjoy it. They want to be the person to bring them the news that this is something worth having in their life."[294]
After the film's release and unusually strong box office performance over its first two weeks, it was debated as the one film capable of surpassing Titanic's worldwide gross, and its continued strength perplexed box office analysts.[301] Other films in recent years had been cited as contenders for surpassing Titanic, such as 2008's The Dark Knight,[302] but Avatar was considered the first film with a genuine chance to do so, and its numbers being aided by higher ticket prices for 3D screenings[301] did not fully explain its success to box office analysts. "Most films are considered to be healthy if they manage anything less than a 50% drop from their first weekend to their second. Dipping just 11% from the first to the third is unheard of," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box-office analysis for Hollywood.com. "This is just unprecedented. I had to do a double take. I thought it was a miscalculation."[303] Analysts predicted second place for the film's worldwide gross, but most were uncertain about it surpassing Titanic because "Today's films flame out much faster than they did when Titanic was released."[303] Brandon Gray, president of Box Office Mojo, believed in the film's chances of becoming the highest-grossing film of all time, though he also believed it was too early to surmise because it had only played during the holidays. He said, "While Avatar may beat Titanic's record, it will be tough, and the film is unlikely to surpass Titanic in attendance. Ticket prices were about $3 cheaper in the late 1990s."[303] Cameron said he did not think it was realistic to "try to topple Titanic off its perch" because it "just struck some kind of chord" and there had been other good films in recent years.[304] He changed his prediction by mid-January. "It's gonna happen. It's just a matter of time," he said.[305]
You've got to compete head on with these other epic works of fantasy and fiction, the Tolkiens and the Star Wars and the Star Treks. People want a persistent alternate reality to invest themselves in and they want the detail that makes it rich and worth their time. They want to live somewhere else. Like Pandora.
James Cameron on the success of Avatar[306]
Although analysts have been unable to agree that Avatar's success is attributable to one primary factor, several explanations have been advanced. First, January is historically "the dumping ground for the year's weakest films", and this also applied to 2010.[307] Cameron himself said he decided to open the film in December so that it would have less competition from then to January.[294] Titanic capitalized on the same January predictability, and earned most of its gross in 1998.[307] Additionally, Avatar established itself as a "must-see" event. Gray said, "At this point, people who are going to see Avatar are going to see Avatar and would even if the slate was strong."[307] Marketing the film as a "novelty factor" also helped. Fox positioned the film as a cinematic event that should be seen in the theaters. "It's really hard to sell the idea that you can have the same experience at home," stated David Mumpower, an analyst at BoxOfficeProphets.com.[307] The "Oscar buzz" surrounding the film and international viewings helped. "Two-thirds of Titanic's haul was earned overseas, and Avatar [tracked] similarly ...Avatar opened in 106 markets globally and was No. 1 in all of them", and the markets "such as Russia, where Titanic saw modest receipts in 1997 and 1998, are white-hot today" with "more screens and moviegoers" than before.[307]
According to Variety, films in 3D accumulated $1.3 billion in 2009, "a threefold increase over 2008 and more than 10% of the total 2009 box-office gross". The increased ticket price – an average of $2 to $3 per ticket in most markets – helped the film.[307] Likewise, Entertainment Weekly attributed the film's success to 3D glasses but also to its "astronomic word-of-mouth". Not only do some theaters charge up to $18.50 for IMAX tickets, but "the buzz" created by the new technology was the possible cause for sold-out screenings.[308] Gray said Avatar having no basis in previously established material makes its performance remarkable and even more impressive. "The movie might be derivative of many movies in its story and themes," he said, "but it had no direct antecedent like the other top-grossing films: Titanic (historical events), the Star Wars movies (an established film franchise), or The Lord of the Rings (literature). It was a tougher sell ..."[307] The Hollywood Reporter estimated that after a combined production and promotion cost of between $387 million and $437 million, the film turned a net profit of $1.2 billion.[309]
