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'Avatar 2' Tops Box Office for 7th Weekend

Zoe Saldana attends a premiere for the film Avatar: The Way of Water, at Dolby theatre in Los Angeles, California, U.S., December 12, 2022. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
Zoe Saldana attends a premiere for the film Avatar: The Way of Water, at Dolby theatre in Los Angeles, California, U.S., December 12, 2022. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
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'Avatar 2' Tops Box Office for 7th Weekend

Zoe Saldana attends a premiere for the film Avatar: The Way of Water, at Dolby theatre in Los Angeles, California, U.S., December 12, 2022. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
Zoe Saldana attends a premiere for the film Avatar: The Way of Water, at Dolby theatre in Los Angeles, California, U.S., December 12, 2022. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

“Avatar: The Way of Water” claimed the No. 1 spot on the domestic box office charts for the seventh weekend in a row with an additional $15.7 million, according to studio estimates on Sunday.

It was a quiet weekend overall, notable mostly for the Hindi language blockbuster “Pathaan” that broke into the top five and the post-Oscar nominations rereleases of films like “Everything Everywhere All At Once” and “The Fabelmans.”

“Avatar 2’s” first-place North American run has only been matched by the first “Avatar,” and, in the past 25 years, bested by “Titanic” (which stayed in first place for 15 weeks). All three were directed by James Cameron.

Globally, “The Way of Water” has now grossed an estimated $2.1 billion, passing “Star Wars: The Force Awakens," to become the fourth-highest grossing film of all time (of which Cameron has directed three).

“James Cameron just keeps ticking off all the records and milestones,” said Paul Dergarabedian, the senior media analyst for Comscore. “And it's still got a wide-open marketplace.”

Second place went to Universal and DreamWorks’ family-oriented offering “Puss In Boots: The Last Wish,” which made $10.6 million in its sixth weekend. The animated spinoff has earned over $140.8 million in North America and was recently made available to stream at home, too.

Third place went to Sony's “A Man Called Otto" with $6.8 million from 3,957 locations. The meme-able horror “M3GAN,” a Universal release, snuck into fourth place with $6.4 million in its fourth weekend, bringing its domestic total to $82.3 million.

The Indian film “Pathaan,” starring Shah Rukh Kha in his first role in five years, settled in fifth place with $5.9 million from only 695 screens.

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Entertainment

Alfonso Cuarón, Cate Blanchett Bring Series ‘Disclaimer’ to Venice Film Festival 

Cast member Cate Blanchett poses on the red carpet during arrivals for the screening of the mini-series "Disclaimer", out of competition, at the 81st Venice Film Festival, in Venice, Italy August 29, 2024. (Reuters)
Cast member Cate Blanchett poses on the red carpet during arrivals for the screening of the mini-series "Disclaimer", out of competition, at the 81st Venice Film Festival, in Venice, Italy August 29, 2024. (Reuters)
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Alfonso Cuarón, Cate Blanchett Bring Series ‘Disclaimer’ to Venice Film Festival 

Cast member Cate Blanchett poses on the red carpet during arrivals for the screening of the mini-series "Disclaimer", out of competition, at the 81st Venice Film Festival, in Venice, Italy August 29, 2024. (Reuters)
Cast member Cate Blanchett poses on the red carpet during arrivals for the screening of the mini-series "Disclaimer", out of competition, at the 81st Venice Film Festival, in Venice, Italy August 29, 2024. (Reuters)

Alfonso Cuarón is the first to admit that he does not know how to make a television series. He might even be too old to learn how, he said.

The Oscar-winning filmmaker has technically now made a series, the seven-part AppleTV+ show “Disclaimer,” four episodes of which premiered Thursday at the Venice Film Festival. But he did it his way: Like a film.

Based on Renée Knight’s 2015 book of the same name, “Disclaimer” is a psychological thriller about a documentarian and journalist, Catherine Ravenscroft (Cate Blanchett), who discovers she’s a character in a novel that reveals her darkest secret.

Cuarón, Blanchett and Kevin Kline all made the journey to the Italian film festival to debut and speak about the show before it begins streaming on Oct. 11.

“I read the book and immediately in my mind I saw a film, but I didn’t know how to make that film,” Cuarón, the director of films including “Gravity” and “Roma,” said in a news conference Thursday. “It was way too long. I could not shape it as such.”

It was only later, he said, that he thought it might work in longer form, inspired by predecessors like Rainer Werner Fassbinder, David Lynch and Krzysztof Kieślowski.

“I was intrigued and that was the point of departure,” Cuarón said.

He started writing with one name in mind for Catherine: Blanchett, terrified that she might say no. Not only did she not say no, she also was the one who suggested Kline for a British character. Sacha Baron Cohen plays her husband in the show and Kodi Smit-McPhee plays her son.

All soon realized that approaching it as a film, and shooting it as a film, would take much longer than a normal series. He even enlisted two cinematographers, Emmanuel Lubezki and Bruno Delbonnel, to add a distinct visual language to the different perspectives in the story. All told, it took about a year.

“It was a really long process,” Cuarón said. “And I really feel for the actors because they were stuck with the characters for way too long.”

Blanchett laughed that they were “still recovering.”

The final three episodes will screen Friday at the festival. Though the festival is most known for its feature film premieres, it does play host to select series as well. This year those also include Joe Wright’s Mussolini biopic “M: Son of the Century,” Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The New Years” and Thomas Vinterberg’s “Families Like Ours.”