American Cinema Editors nominated three science fiction films out of five for the feature film category. The sci-fi honors were granted to James Cameron, John Refoua and Stephen Rivkin for Avatar, Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey for Star Trek, Julian Clark for District 9and Maryann Brandon and Mary Jo Markey for Star Trek. The dramatic honors were granted to Bob Murawski and Chris Innis for The Hurt Lockerand Dana Glauberman for Up in the Air. 

The category for best edited comedy or musical feature film nominations were granted to Alan Edward Bell for 500 Days of Summer, Debra Neil-Fisher for The Hangover, Joe Hutshing and David Moritz for It’s Complicated, Richard Marks for Julie and Juliaand Roderick Jaynes for A Serious Man. 

Coraline, Fantastic Mr. Fox and Up were granted nominations for the animated feature category. 

Visit ACE site for a complete and detailed lists by clicking here.

What I find interesting about the weekend box office results is that Daybreakers didn’t outwit Sherlock Holmes. I think, we all new Avatar would remain on top.  James Cameron movie stays on top because it’s a great story with brilliant actors and direction. The special effects are beyond brilliant, but minor to the story.  I don’t think all the special effects in the universe without a great story brings people back to see a movie again and again.

Results:

1. Avatar
$48,500,000

2. Sherlock Holmes
$16,610,000

3. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
$16,300,000

4. Daybreakers
$15,000,000

5. It’s Complicated
$11,000,000

6. Leap Year
$9,165,000

7. The Blind Side
$7,750,000

8. Up in the Air
$7,100,000

9. Youth in Revolt
$7,000,000

10. The Princess and the Frog
$4,743,000

in millions of dollars

(Source)

Of course, Avatar found Pandora at the Box Office.  I am very please with the whole process and somewhat surprised.  Who would have thought James Cameron, or any filmmaker, having two films reach the top grossing film of all time?  

Now, I want to see how long  Avatar will remain No. 1 at the box office.  I can guess two weeks. Daybreakers might knock it down this weekend, but I doubt it.

Results:

1. Avatar
$96,916,087 — $380,540,297

2. Sherlock Holmes
$46,464,810 — $148,567,766

3. Alvin And The Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
$41,157,394 — $161,884,676

4. It’s Complicated
$24,986,790 –$65,362,665

5. The Blind Side
$14,883,591 — $211,446,909

6. Up In The Air
$13,986,528 — $47,641,741

7. The Princess and the Frog
$11,860,543 — $87,895,571

8. Did You Hear About The Morgans?
$6,420,205 — $26,800,251

9. Nine
$5,377,354 — $15,222,127

10. Invictus
$5,107,510 — $31,784,643

(Source)

James Cameron optioned a soon to be published nonfiction book called The Last Train from Hiroshima: The Survivors Look Back by Charles Pellegrino. This might be a potential directing gig for the top box office director of all time.  Cameron even purchased the option with his own funds.

According to the trades, when Cameron was in Japan in late December promoting Avatar, he visited Tsutomu Yamaguchi, one of the last survivors of the U.S. bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during WWII. Yamaguchi died Monday at the age of 93.

Pellegrino’s book arrives in the bookstores this month. Advance reviews are very positive, which takes place over two days and weaves together eyewitness accounts of the Japanese civilians and American pilots who experienced the atomic explosions firsthand. According to the book, 30 people are known to have fled Hiroshima for Nagasaki — where they arrived just in time to survive the second bomb. Yamaguchi was the sole survivor who experienced the full effects of the detonations at ground zero both times.

At this point, project is not set up at Fox or Cameron’s Lightstorm Entertainment, but the crystal ball says a potential movie. The special effects would be awesome. I interviewed Diane Lake (Frida) who wrote a script called Hiroshima for one of Cameron’s cohorts at Digital Domain. There might be a connection here folks.

James Cameron will beat himself when Avatar pulls up to being the No. 1 grossing film of all time, which Cameron’s Titanic holds at $1.8 billion.

The 20th Century Fox movie reached the No. 2 grossing film of all time at the worldwide box office with a total of $1.14 billion through Wednesday – the film has only been in the theaters for three weeks. That’s kicking some booty at the box office.

Avatar‘s domestic total reached $374.4 million through Wednesday.  The foreign draw brought in $760.9 million. All that money means Avatar best the $1.1 billion reached by The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

Avatar heads into the weekend strong as ever.  Most likely, the science fiction movie will cash in $100 million at the box office worldwide.

Avatar isn’t alone in being a money winner. Sherlock Holmes and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel maintain a strong reel time, even though kids went back to school after a winter break.

James Cameron’s Avatar is ringing in the new decade as a success story of a great filmmaker. The science fiction story estimated a worldwide total of $1 billion through Sunday, marking the fourth highest grossing film of all time.

As far as the states are concerned, Avatar totaled $352.1 million, “the best gross ever for a film in its third weekend,” according to the trades.  

Results:

1. Avatar
$68,300,000

2. Sherlock Holmes
$38,385,000

3. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel
$36,600,000

4. It’s Complicated
$18,700,000

5. The Blind Side
$12,650,000

6. Up in the Air
$11,350,000

7. The Princess and the Frog
$10,000,000

8. Did You Hear About the Morgans?
$5,200,000

9. Nine
$4,250,000

10. Invictus
$4,130,000

in millions of dollars

(Source)

Avatar hit the $300 million mark on New Year’s Day. The science fiction movie grossed approximately $25 million on its 15th day in release. Now, the James Cameron movie totals $308.8 million domestically. 

The trades estimate a worldwide total above $800 million, which will be confirmed on Sunday. 

The next top four grossing films for New Year’s Day starts with Sherlock Holmes in second place, grossing an estimated $14.9 million with a total of $117.2 million. Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, grossing an estimated $13 million of $133.7 million. It’s Complicated grossed an estimated $7.1 million of $57.3 million. The Blind Side hit the $200 million mark, grossing an estimated $4.5 million of $200.9 million.

I don’t know whether this is scary or awesome, folks–when I first heard there was going to be an Avatar movie I was actually pretty excited.  I’d enjoyed the show quite a bit, and found it had a lot of solid writing to it, especially for a show geared more toward teenagers.

But then I found out that M. Night Shyamalan was handling the directing for it, and my jaw just dropped.  This guy’s career had been on a steady decline pretty much since his first movie showed up–every Shyamalan movie gets progressively, incrementally, worse than the one before it–and to hand him a property like this strikes me in the same amused yet horrified fashion that handing a chimp a gun strikes me.  I mean, come on!  You just don’t DO that sort of thing!

But stills are emerging, and the trailer’s pretty awesome in its own right, but the question of the day is, can Shyamalan break his own chain of disastrous movies to turn out another Sixth Sense?  Or will a terrific property be ruined in the process?

James Cameron’s Avatar grossed $19.4 million on Monday, marking the science fiction-fantasy movie at a total of $232.1 million in just 11 days.  Obviously, Avatar is headed toward $300 million mark this weekend. 

The overall domestic box office is up 43% compared to last year. 

Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, a wonderfully entertaining movie for kids, came in second place at $12.4 million with a total of $87.7 million.  Sherlock Holmes came in third with $11. 2 million, totaling $73.6 million for its four-day run.

I guess it’s true in the movie business that every day is like a Saturday between Christmas and New Years.

(Source)

Remember how I was talking about, before, how Avatar 2 was going to have a pretty much impossible time going back to Pandora, because they’d either have to behave rationally and absolutely destroy the cave people by bringing back a proper armament loadout,  or completely blow off rational thought altogether to make the Na’avi come out on top again?

Well, as it turns out, there’s a growing body of evidence that says that Cameron et al will be taking option C, otherwise known as “We’re not even gonna TRY.” Dig the word:

“What would you think if I told you that should a sequel to AVATAR happen, it might not even take place on Pandora? It’s all up the air as of now. But remember I’m telling you this. Pandora is not the be all and end all of the Consortium.”

Follow that up with:

“We have some story ideas for how to branch out into other moons of the Polyphemus and the Alpha Centauri A solar system.”

So there you go.  They’re not even going to try, because the choice is either to have the Consortium curb-stomp the entire planet or have the Na’avi come up with some kind of mystic hoodoo bullhonkery to beat them once again.

All things considered, this is probably for the best.