Avatar is most successful movie in US history

As expected, Avatar became the highest-grossing film in US box-office history today, passing Titanic‘s record of approximately $600 million given the estimates from Tuesday’s receipts. This is not a surprise today, but maybe even a month ago, certainly two months ago, this news would’ve made our jaws drop.

What is there left to say about Avatar? How about that the No. 1 movie in domestic box-office history paints a nasty picture of Americans and the human race for that matter? I suppose that’s an argument, but I don’t generally look for political undertones in movies unless they slap me in the face, which Avatar did. If Cameron didn’t intend it, he wouldn’t have written the words “Shock and Awe” into his script.

So today we celebrate the financial gains created by our own self-loathing, America. I’m not upset, or bothered or anything, I just think it’s highly amusing. The most lucrative singular work of art to ever grace the American screen is one where we root for the humans to die. Yes, there are the exceptions of the rebellious human heroes in the avatar project, but, especially near the end, it’s the homo-sapiens getting blown to bits.

But enough about that, clearly the 3D world (for many of us) of Pandora was completely irresistible and fascinating. We marveled in the creative magic of this film and paid whatever the cost. Plus, the allure to those who weren’t planning to go who ended up going these many weeks later was very strong. Who didn’t recommend this movie. Even if you didn’t think it was the most amazing film you’d ever seen, it was too one-of-a-kind with the 3D and the scope of it all to say “wait for it on DVD.” No. Hell, no. Unless you’re the growing minority with a Blu-ray player, you’re not going to wait for this movie on DVD. The scope would just be completely lost.

So maybe those are some of the answers for why the blue scored all this green. There are probably even more reasons than that, but bottom line is that Avatar has an inherent likability that coupled with groundbreaking visual effects techniques gives it mass appeal.

Congratulations to Fox as well as — and especially — James Cameron for doing it again.