James Cameron defends 'Avatar 2' runtime; says 'don’t want anybody whining about length'

Oscar-winning director James Cameron has been piquing the interest of the fans after releasing updates about the upcoming film, Avatar: The Way of Water. The sequel of the popular film Avatar will show Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri’s (Zoe Saldana) life a decade post the events of the first movie. While the first part witnessed a run time of nearly two hours and 40 minutes, according to Variety, the runtime of the sequel is expected to increase to around three hours.

The increase in the runtime seems to have created a stir among the fans and director Cameron is in no mood to listen to any complaints about the same. After Empire magazine unveiled Kate Winslet’s first look as Ronal from the sequel, the director sat down with the International outlet while explaining the movie’s runtime. 

James Cameron reflects on Avatar 2 long run time

Cameron who had also helmed the first part gave a rational explanation behind the forthcoming film’s long runtime and shared how people don’t complain when they sit in front of the television for any particular show. He said, 

“I don’t want anybody whining about length when they sit and binge-watch [television] for eight hours. I can almost write this part of the review.”

Further, he elucidated and said, “The agonizingly long three-hour movie…’ It’s like, give me a fu****g break. I’ve watched my kids sit and do five one-hour episodes in a row. Here’s the big social paradigm shift that has to happen: it’s okay to get up and go pee.”

Apart from this, The Abyss director also had some strong words for moviegoers who are continuously trolling the first part of Avatar. With $2.84 billion worldwide, the film stands as the highest-grossing movie of all time. Even with that gross, plus nine Oscar nominations and three wins, the film’s much-awaited sequel has become a punching bag for some cinephiles.

The actor who seems to not pay any heed to such trolls, explained, “The trolls will have it that nobody gives a s**t and they can’t remember the characters’ names or one damn thing that happened in the movie. Then they see the movie again and go, ‘Oh, okay, excuse me, let me just shut the fuck up right now.’ So I’m not worried about that.”

Meanwhile, according to the magazine, after the epic new saga’s release, the filmmaker is looking at the possibility of passing on the baton to someone else. “The Avatar films themselves are kind of all-consuming,” Cameron admits. “I’ve got some other things I’m developing as well that are exciting. I think eventually over time – I don’t know if that’s after three or after four – I’ll want to pass the baton to a director that I trust to take over, so I can go do some other stuff that I’m also interested in. Or maybe not. I don’t know.," he concluded. 

IMAGE: Twitter/OfficialAvatar/AP