Since the news broke that Avatar would return to theaters on September 23, there are many who have wondered why. Yes, now seems like a good time with Avatar: The Way of Water just a couple of months away, but it's not as if the 2009 blockbuster hasn't graced the big screen since then (a re-release during the pandemic saw it overtake Avengers: Endgame at the box office again).
Talking during this week's global press conference for the Avatar re-release, filmmaker James Cameron explained some of the technical changes to the movie and offered some compelling reasons for why it's worth watching this particular version of the movie on the big screen again.
"We authored the film for the big screen in 3D. And now we've remastered it in 4K, in high-dynamic range and [included] some 48-frame-per-second sections in the film," the director explains. "It's looking better than it ever looked, even back in its initial release."
"Even if [you've seen] the movie on streaming or Blu-ray, [you] still haven't really seen the movie the way we intended it to be seen. And, you know, we just watched the film recently when we finished the whole remastering process, and it kinda blew us away."
Following Avatar's huge level of success when it was originally released in theaters thirteen years ago, many studios attempted to replicate that by taking the lazy approach of converting movies into 3D. It didn't really work and as audiences came to realise the format had become a gimmick, the craze died down and has mostly gone away.
For Cameron, however, he believes there's still room for 3D movies (it helps that he does them in the right way, of course).
"I would say that 3D was embraced in general for a period of time," he explains. "I mean, Avatar won Best Cinematography with a 3D digital camera. No digital camera had ever won the Best Cinematography Oscar before. 3D appears to most people to be over, but it's really not over. It's just been accepted. It's just now part of the choices that you face when you go to a theater."
"When colour first came out, it was a big deal. People used to go see movies because they were in colour. I think around the time of Avatar, people went to see movies because they were in 3D. Nobody's gonna go see a movie today because it's in 3D," Cameron continued. "It's all the other factors by which we choose a film. In terms of long-term cultural impact...well, I guess we'll find out if people show up for Avatar[: The Way of Water]."
Everything we've heard from those who have seen footage from the sequel in 3D has been overwhelmingly positive, so something tells us Cameron is about to bring that back in a big way. That will likely begin with the Avatar re-release, though, and it will definitely be refreshing to experience a movie that makes good use of the format again.
To whet audiences' appetites, Disney/20th Century Studios will re-release Avatar in theaters on September 23. As for Avatar: The Way of Water, that arrives in theaters worldwide on December 16.