The Canadian director took 12 years to prepare and shoot Avatar: The Way of the Water, the second installment in one of cinema’s most ambitious franchises. And as for AvatarJames Cameron’s team had to develop not only the narrative and visual universe, but also the necessary technology.
Avatar: The Way of the Water was a titanic job. In February 2010, James Cameron and producer Jon Landau decided to hold a mini technology summit with the “Avatar” teams to review the technical elements of the feature film and identify strengths and weaknesses. “I do not think that The way of the water would have seen the light of day if we had not engaged in this exercise”, indicated the filmmaker who, once the meeting was over, began to think regarding the rest.
Note pages
As soon as James Cameron gets to work, he fills notebooks. In total, the director and producer fills 1500 pages also containing possible plots. And it is at this moment that he realizes that it will take him much more than two films to tell the story of Pandora, Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana). In The way of the waterthe couple now have children, Neteyam (James Flatters), Lo’ak (Britain Dalton), Tuk (Trinity Jo-Li Bliss) and Kiri (Sigourney Weaver), an adopted teenager.
But humans are coming back. Apart from mining unobtainium, they also want to colonize Pandora in order to settle there, as Earth is on the verge of becoming uninhabitable. The Sullys and the Omatikaya tribe flee towards the mountains to join the Metkayina, a clan that lives on the water, whose leaders Ronal (Kate Winslet) and Tonowari (Cliff Curtis) have no choice but to help them. But that doesn’t stop Colonel Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) from chasing them.
The time spent refining the story for this and subsequent installments has allowed the team to The way of the water to develop the technological tools essential to this filming, in other words to find a way to capture performances underwater, a first in the history of cinema. “The key is to shoot truly underwater, but just on the surface so that the actors swim correctly, get out of the water correctly and dive correctly. And it feels real because the movements were real and the emotion was real,” said the filmmaker.
An exceptional shoot
Stephen Lang is therefore back as a villain – thanks to a technology made from the transfer of DNA and memories – even if his character passed away in the previous part. Asked by the QMI Agency regarding his preparation for this Avatar: The Way of the Waterthe actor said that the months leading up to James Cameron’s first helm had been intense.
“It was very physical. I had to work on my flexibility, my energy and my strength. I did a lot of parkour, a lot of archery, a lot of martial arts. For fights, I studied knife fights, stick fights and obviously automatic weapons. I also had to work on everything that happens in the water, it’s no secret that this “Avatar” takes place in phenomenal quantities of water.
“With Jim Cameron and Avatar, you never know when filming starts or even when it ends, Stephen Lang said with a laugh when asked how long he was immersed in the feature film. Anytime Jim can call and say he needs us.”
“If I remember correctly, the filming lasted a few years. We started filming in 2017 and our preparation in 2015. We were taking breaks before coming back and starting over. Things got really serious in 2017 until 2019. The schedule was intense, I don’t even know how long I spent on set, between 100 and 200 days. I admit I lost count. I showed up and worked.”
The resurrection of cinema in theaters
Since the use of performance capture technology – the “motion / performance capture” used by Peter Jackson to The Lord of the Ringsthen by Andy Serkis for his remarkable trilogy The Planet of the Apes -, the Academy of Oscars struggles to recognize this type of game as an actor’s game in its own right, systematically snubbing the actors who use it.
“The capture of performance is a reality more present in the cinema today. How people will adapt and how it will be recognized is out of our control. I knew, as soon as I saw the first Avatar that Zoe Saldana’s performance is one of the most impressive in the history of cinema. Capturing a service is a service in its own right. I don’t know how to explain that anymore.”
“It’s a game that is very close to that of a theater stage because of its minimalism. It is a technology that requires the full use of all the tools available to the actors. Is it more difficult? No. Playing is simple at bottom, but it is a difficult art”, underlined Stephen Lang.
Another serious subject is cinema attendance, which has seen a marked drop in the United States and Europe since the pandemic. The first Avatar had not only created a rush for 3D technology and increased box office receipts, but also shattered all records, with moviegoers flocking to theaters to see the feature film. Avatar: The Way of the Water will he be able to convince the crowds to reconnect with the dark rooms?
“It’s hard to say, but I tend to answer ‘yes’. It is complex to anticipate what the public’s response will be. Due to the nature of the film, its importance and the expectations of moviegoers, I believe that The way of the water is the perfect feature film to bring people back to cinemas and to convince new moviegoers to come.”
“I believe that cinema will never be the same once more. But cinema is constantly evolving. If we compare what the films of the 1930s were, what they became in the 1960s, we realize that it was radically different, in particular because of the democratization of television. What is important is that the cinema is back. It’s impossible to transpose the cinematic experience anywhere other than in a theater – the big screen, sitting with strangers and communing in front of a screen.”
- Avatar: The Way of the Water opened on December 16.
