The return of James Cameron

By: Patrick Sauriol
Date: Thursday, January 22, 2004
Source: Variety

Today Variety is reporting that Oscar-winning director James Cameron (TITANIC) is almost ready to make his next feature. The man who gave us ALIENS, THE TERMINATOR and THE ABYSS told a TERMINATOR 2 audience this week that his next movie will be a "big-budget science-fiction film with a pile of special effects" which Cameron will film using the 3D Reality Camera System he co-developed. Cameron wants to start filming this new picture sometime later this year.

While Cameron didn't reveal any further details about what this new sci-fi project is to the theater audience, Lightstorm's Jon Landau told Variety's reporters that whatever this mysterious project may be, it's not AVATAR nor is it THE DIVE. AVATAR was a proposed science fiction film that would have used extensive CG imagery throughout most of the film; a scriptment of the movie's storyline was leaked online a number of years ago. THE DIVE was announced next year and is a film based on the world freediving husband and wife team of Francisco Ferreras and Audrey Mestre. Cameron still plans on directing THE DIVE but not as his next project.

So what could the new Cameron movie be? He's been associated with a live-action version of the Japanese anime BATTLE ANGEL ALITA but we've also heard talk that he's wanted to do a movie about the first manned mission to Mars, grounding the movie as much in facts and proposed scientific concepts as possible. With President Bush recently announcing the hopes to for America to return to the moon and then voyage to Mars, did that spur Cameron to make a decision?


We should find out shortly.


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