Avatar: Fire and Ash leads this week's winter sci-fi special issue

When it comes to taking risks, film director James Cameron is in a league of his own. He currently has three of the top five highest-grossing films of all time under his belt, and now he's back with the third instalment of his Avatar saga – Avatar: Fire and Ash.

He reckons that if it's watched by 240 million people, all paying an average of $10 for a cinema ticket, it will be deemed a success. And that gross take of $2.4 billion will come in handy if he's going to be able to make the fourth Avatar film. So no pressure.

Cameron's been here before, of course. Titanic, his first blockbuster back in 1997, sailed miles over budget, prompting memories of the disastrous Raise the Titanic, a film that cost so much to make its producer Lew Grade quipped that it would have been cheaper to lower the Atlantic.

Yet, nearly 30 years on, Titanic still sits at number four on the list of biggest box-office films. Say what you like about Cameron, he knows how to bet big and win.

This week, as part of our sci-fi special, we sit down not only with Cameron himself, but also with the film's stars Oona Chaplin and Sam Worthington, to find out exactly what keeps the Avatar world spinning.

There is obviously a huge audience for Fire and Ash, but whether this latest one can save a film industry that is suffering badly in a post-Covid world, who can tell. The only safe bet is that you should never bet against James Cameron.

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Also in this week's Radio Times:

• Actor and presenter Alan Cumming talks risk-taking, speaking his mind and being a Scottish superhero.
• Ella Purnell, the star of post-apocalypse drama Fallout, would be right at home if the world was to end.
• A new documentary The Real Salt Path digs into the backstory of Raynor and Moth Winn and the veracity of their memoir.

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