Avatar is a good movie and a breakthrough in 3D cinema.  We know that.  But how did it fare in the box office?  By the numbers it made (so far)…

• $77 million on opening weekend
• $75 million during Christmas weekend
• $250.4 million in its first twelve days of release (that’s #6 fastest all-time and #1 non-sequel all-time)
• $726,612,776 (worldwide) in its first twelve days of release
• $39 million from 249 IMAX screens in just 10 days
• #3 spot in the Box Office Mojo chart of the biggest Tuesday box-office earnings ever
• Total gross: Domestic: $268,886,074 (36.1%) + Foreign: $476,192,825 (63.9%) = Worldwide: $745,078,899 (as of today, 12/31)
• The Hot Blog speculates that “there is a very real chance that the film will break $1 billion worldwide before it’s fourth weekend starts. If not, it seems pretty sure to happen in that fourth weekend.”

Sounds like Cameron and crew will make bank off this massively successful movie.  And do they deserve it.  Avatar was in many aspects an experimental film for James Cameron and he took a big risk in making it.  (It cost around $500 million to make.)  It all paid off, so to speak; critics praised it, movie-goers flocked to it, and the 3D and IMAX integration successfully added to the immersive experience.  Job well done all around.

Update: Avatar hits $1 billion in seventeen days, reaching that milestone faster than any other movie in history.  Right now it remains the third largest grossing movie, behind Lord of the Rings: Return of the King and Cameron’s other hit Titanic.

Then there’s this: “Free Love Forum takes you behind the scenes of the revolutionary new bootleg of the revolutionary new movie.”  Please sit back and enjoy this comedy mockumentary of “Avatar: The Bootleg.”

[Via TheHotBlog; BoxOfficeMojo; Slashfilm; AC; Collider; TechCrunch; The Inquirer]