14 DAY TRIAL // Ever since James Cameron’s blockbuster film “Avatar” came out at the end of last year, audiences have seen countless 3D releases, like the more recent horror flick “Piranha 3D,” which Cameron calls utter nonsense.
The famous director is featured in the latest issue of Vanity Fair magazine where he talks the making of “Avatar,” the films he liked as a boy and what he makes of the industry and how 3D is being used.
He’s promoting the extended re-release of the alien movie, which hit theaters this Friday and, as we also reported the other day, underperformed at the box office.
In the interview, Cameron says that, while many films used 3D in a way that made them look better, in the sense that it brought something new to the story, others are just using it to charge people extra for a ticket.
Such is the case of the recently released “Piranha 3D,” which Cameron considers as the perfect example of what one may find at the bottom of the creativity barrel.
“I tend almost never to throw other films under the bus, but [Piranha 3D] is exactly an example of what we should not be doing in 3D. Because it just cheapens the medium and reminds you of the bad 3D horror films from the 70s and 80s, like Friday the 13th 3D,” the famous director says.
For some movie studios, making a 3D movie is nothing but one last desperate attempt at milking a story for the last drops, regardless of how much that may sadden or upset fans.
“When movies got to the bottom of the barrel of their creativity and at the last gasp of their financial lifespan, they did a 3D version to get the last few drops of blood out of the turnip,” Cameron explains.
Of course, that’s not to say that all recent 3D releases fall in this category. For some, “Avatar” opened new doors and they went on to write history at the box office, the never-modest filmmaker says.
“We worked for four-and-a-half years to make Avatar what it is. There are a number of good movies that are being natively authored in 3D that are coming out. But what you saw was sort of the gold rush. After Avatar, people tried to cash in,” Cameron says of post-Avatar movies.
“Alice in Wonderland and How to Train Your Dragon – especially the latter, which I think is excellent in 3D – they were films that were in the pipeline for some time. They weren’t cashing in, they were just coming out. You’re going to see the whole market kind of stabilize and redefine itself over the next couple of years,” he explains.
He then goes on to say that audiences must differentiate between a film shot in 3D and one converted to 3D. They should also know from the start that a film in 3D doesn’t necessarily mean a good film.
For the full Vanity Fair piece with James Cameron, please see here.