Although Sam Worthington believes James Cameron will begin shooting Avatar 2 and Avatar 3  when the writer-director is good and ready, co-star Zoe Saldana believes that time will be early next year.  Back in March, Cameron said he was building momentum on the scripts for the films, which will be shot back-to-back and include underwater motion-capture technology.  Saldana also confirmed on the Jonathan Ross Show [via DigitalSpy] they’ll be shooting the sequels back-to-back because “if we just do two and then wait, I’ll probably be 45 or 50 by the time we get to part three. It takes a long time, it’s a very hard process.”  She also doesn’t believe Avatar 2 will be released until 2015.

Before going off to Romania to shoot his next film, The Keeping Room, about a Civil War soldier who has broken off from the Union Army encounters a group of women who have been left to fend for themselves, Collider got the opportunity to chat with actor Sam Worthington about the surf drama Drift, which is available on demand July 2nd and in theaters everywhere August 2nd.

While we will post what he had to say about that film in June, we did want to share what he had to say about some of his other upcoming projects.  During the interview, he talked about how different his character in The Keeping Room is, how working with director David Ayer on the action thriller Ten was the best experience, what it was like to work with someone as iconic as Arnold Schwarzenegger, that James Cameron will start shooting the Avatar sequels whenever he’s ready, and how he doesn’t think there will be a third Clash of the Titans films.  Check out what he had to say after the jump.

James Cameron is building momentum on writing the scripts for Avatar 2 and Avatar 3, and while he hasn’t quite cracked the story yet, he knows that some of the second film will take place underwater.  While it’s possible to shoot dry-for-wet, it’s not entirely convincing, and as we all know, Cameron loves a technological challenge.  Speaking to the NAB Technology Summit on Cinema [via Empire], Avatar producer Jon Landau revealed that “We have kept a team of digital artists on from Avatar in order to test how we can create performance capture underwater.  We could simulate water [in CG], but we can’t simulate the actor’s experience, so we are going to capture performance in a tank.”

Landau didn’t provide any further details on the development of that process, but did add that Avatar 2 and 3, which will shoot back-to-back, will wrap up the story of Jake (Sam Worthington) and Neytiri (Zoe Saldana).  This falls in line with Cameron’s comments from last September where he said he wanted a fourth Avatar movie, but it would be a prequel.

Last November, James Cameron said he hoped to have the scripts for Avatar 2 and Avatar 3 finished by February, and planned to shoot later this year.  February has now come and gone, and Cameron is still at work on getting back into the world of Pandora.  But not to worry, Avatar fans.  Cameron is still plugging away at the sequels, and he’s close to reaching the point where the story begins to write itself.

Hit the jump for more.

After coasting on holdovers for weeks, Hollywood studios have unleashed a feast of new features: just in time for Christmas. Even with all the competition, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey had no trouble staying in first place with an estimated $36.7 million. Jack Reacher placed second, but with less than half The Hobbit’s total. And with Les Miserables and Django Unchained on deck for Christmas Day, it looks like more than one new title will have a hard time distinguishing itself from the holiday crowd.

With only days remaining before its much-anticipated return to Middle Earth, the box office was a relatively quiet place. Once again, holdovers ruled and grosses were small. In fact, the only real surprise was which of the week’s seasoned veterans came out on top. That would be Skyfall: the James Bond blockbuster that last held the top spot four weeks ago.

At yesterday’s New York City press day for The Hobbit, I was able to sit down with Weta Digital’s Sr. Visual Effects Supervisor Joe Letteri for an extended video interview.  While Weta is currently hard at work on the next two Hobbit films, they’re also working on a few other high profile projects.  Towards the end of our interview, I got a few updates on Weta’s work for Man of Steel, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, The Wolverine, Iron Man 3, and the Avatar sequels.  As you might imagine, the updates on the projects are focused on the visual effects, but if you’re a movie nerd like me, it’s always cool to hear how they’re working to make the effects look even better and what scenes Weta is working on.  Hit the jump to watch.

Box office rankings were frozen in time this weekend as the top three films remained unchanged for a third straight frame. Once again, top honors went to The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2, closely followed by Skyfall.  Spielberg’s Lincoln claimed third. There were also two new releases, though neither hailed from a major studio. The Weinstein Co.’s Killing Them Softly had the most promise, but not even Brad Pitt’s presence could push the drama to $10 million on this notoriously low-grossing weekend.

James Cameron is a very rich man, and as the director of the two highest grossing films of all time, he has the clout to move forward on his next project whenever the hell he wants.  We already know that he’s next set to direct Avatar 2 and 3 back-to-back, but he’s been a little busy diving to the ocean’s deepest point and mentoring the use of 3D cameras.  It now appears that he’s ready to get going in earnest, as he recently provided a hoped-for timetable of when the scripts will be finished and when shooting might begin.  Hit the jump for more.

This week on Blu-ray, Wes Anderson’s latest comes to home video, the highest grossing film of all time gets a non-exclusive 3D release, and the Christmas season officially begins with a holiday favorite Blu-ray upgrade.  Here’s a brief look at this week’s offerings:

• Avatar (3D Blu-ray + Blu-ray/ DVD Combo Pack) – 24.99 (38% off)
• Chernobyl Diaries (Blu-ray/DVD Combo + UltraViolet Digital Copy) - $19.96 (45% off)
• A League of Their Own [Blu-ray] – $13.99 (30% off)
• Looney Tunes Platinum Collection: Volume Two [Blu-ray] – $30.99 (31% off)
• Mad Men: Season Five [Blu-ray] – $29.99 (40% off)
• Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted (Three-Disc Blu-ray 3D / Blu-ray / DVD Combo + Digital Copy + UltraViolet) – $27.99 (49% off)
• Moonrise Kingdom (Two-Disc Combo Pack: Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy + UltraViolet) – $19.99 (43% off)
• Pete’s Dragon: 35th Anniversary Edition [Blu-ray] – $17.99 (40% off)
• Santa Clause [Blu-ray] – $14.85 (26% off)
• That’s My Boy [Blu-ray] – $19.96 (45% off)

Hit the jump for all the details.

In the spirit of TIFF 2012 winding down this weekend, I’m interested in hearing what some of our readers most anticipated pics coming out of the festival are. For me, I was already psyched for films such as Looper, Cloud Atlas, and The Master, but early buzz has also peaked my interest in The Place Beyond the Pines, End of Watch, Spring Breakers, Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp, Dredd 3D, and At Any Price among others. What about you? Where there films that showed up on your radar while following the festival? What about a film you were looking forward to that you were disappointed didn’t fare quite as well as you had hoped (for me, this was Passion)? Let us know in the comments and be sure to check out this week’s fifth spot for a link that can help you get caught up on all of our TIFF 2012 coverage.

In addition to that fifth spot, also on the docket for this week’s Top 5 is a slew of video interviews for Paul W. S. Anderson‘s Resident Evil: Retribution, the first full trailer for Steven Spielberg‘s Lincoln, James Cameron talking the future of Avatar and what his take on Jurassic Park would have been like, and Steve’s video interviews with some of the major names behind Finding Nemo 3D. Brief recaps and links to each lie after the jump.

Though there’s still no firm start date for the promised Avatar sequels, we’ve recently been privy to a few updates on the multiple follow-ups to the highest grossing film of all time.  Last weekend we learned that the planned Avatar 4 would be a prequel to the first film and would be filmed separately from Avatar 2 and 3, and now Cameron has spoken a bit about the writing process for 2 and 3 as well as the technical challenges that he and his team face.

The plan is to shoot both films simultaneously, and when talking about how he’s approaching the dual sequels Cameron mentioned a couple of other follow-ups that were filmed back-to-back as an example of what not to do.  Hit the jump to see what he had to say.

Jon Landau, a longtime collaborator with James Cameron, recently spoke about the progress of Avatar 2 and Avatar 3, but now we have an idea of what the fourth film will be.  From Cameron himself comes word that Avatar 4 will likely be a prequel that explores the colonization process of Pandora before the events of Avatar.  While the creative team is still working on the scripts for the two sequels, Cameron admits he has not yet put pen to paper for the prequel, but seems to have the kernel of an idea in mind.  Hit the jump to hear what he had to say.

The epic love story Titanic, which earned two billion dollars at the box office and won 11 Academy Awards, is making its highly anticipated debut on Blu-ray, in high definition 2D and 3D, on September 10^th. Whether choose the 2D Blu-ray/DVD combo pack or you go for the ultimate experience in immersive 3D, you will get four discs that feature more than two-and-a-half hours of new bonus footage, including an in-depth exploration of the film with James Cameron, documentary footage, 30 deleted scenes, over 60 behind-the-scenes featurettes, more than 2,000 photos, commentaries and more.

During this recent exclusive phone interview with Collider, producer and longtime James Cameron collaborator Jon Landau talked about the phenomenal reward of having the hugely successful film also stand the test of time, the biggest way in which Titanic changed his life, what he’s most excited about fans getting to see on the Blu-ray, his favorite deleted scene, and the challenges of post-converting an older movie. He also talked about the possibility of converting Terminator 2 and Aliens to 3D, how he feels about 48 frames per second and the future of projection, the current status of the release date and scripts for more Avatar films, the recent advances in technology that he’s most looking forward to incorporating into future movies, 3D as the future of home entertainment, and the most rewarding part of his years of collaboration with Cameron. Check out what he had to say after the jump.

Though 20th Century Fox ensured that James Cameron’s next film after Avatar would be a sequel to the highest grossing film of all time, the director has been taking his sweet time getting the project going.  Cameron’s been busy diving to the ocean’s deepest point and documenting it in the film Deepest Challenge, but it appears he’s finally getting ready to return to Pandora.  We previously heard that the director would probably be filming Avatar 2 and 3 at the same time, and latest word from the filmmaker was that he was “in the Avatar business period,” meaning he’s only interested in making Avatar films from here on out.  At the same time, Cameron first dropped word about a possible Avatar 4, and now star Sigourney Weaver claims that the director will film all three Avatar sequels at once.  Hit the jump for more.