James Cameron’s Best Movies Are Getting The Greatest Upgrades Imaginable
James Cameron's best films, including Avatar, True Lies, and The Abyss, will be re-released in Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD for the first time.
Although many people access film through online and streaming providers these days, a contingent of people still value owning physical copies of some of the greatest films. With mega-hits like Titanic and Avatar, director James Cameron has a number of films that fans have been itching to see re-released in physical format following the impending physical release of Cameron’s Avatar: The Way of Water. Luckily for fans of physical formats, according to an article from The Digital Bits, a number of James Cameron’s greatest hits will be making their debut as 4K Ultra HD releases.
During a press event with producer Jon Landau at the Lightstorm Entertainment offices, Landau was asked if fans would be seeing a Blu-ray and 4K Ultra HD release of some of James Cameron’s greatest works, including the original Avatar, 1989’s The Abyss, 1994’s True Lies, and 1997’s Titanic, following the physical release of Avatar: The Way of Water. To this, Landau responded, “2023 baby.” When asked to clarify whether it was happening this year, he responded with the coyly worded, “I would bet it would be.”
This all but confirms that these classic titles will be getting newly formatted physical releases, which should be great news for fans of James Cameron.
Jon Landau was Executive Vice President of Feature Film Production at Twentieth Century Fox and has produced some of history’s biggest blockbuster hits, frequently collaborating with James Cameron. He was behind the James Cameron-directed Avatar film in 2009 and 2022’s Avatar: The Way of Water. He was also behind Titanic, another Cameron-directed film, as well as Solaris, and Alita: Battle Angel, both of which Cameron produced.
James Cameron is a name that will go down in film history as one of the visionaries in the sci-fi action film genre and film in general. Cameron’s films are known for incorporating technology, elements of science fiction, his visceral cinematic style that creates larger-than-life scenes within his films, and his passionate, willful directorial style.
Although many who’ve worked with the director have noted that he can have a dictatorial style on set, there is no denying that his films have been some of the most successful in the history of cinema. As of the time of this writing, he is the director of three of the four highest-grossing films: Titanic, Avatar, and Avatar: The Way of Water. James Cameron’s first directorial credit is the 1982 sequel Piranha II: The Spawning, and he is also the brain behind 1984’s The Terminator and 1986’s Aliens.
Although Landau made no mention of a new physical release for Aliens or The Terminator, there is reason to believe that both might be getting the same treatment sooner rather than later. There is a new series on FX in the Alien franchise that should be arriving within the next year, and the 40th anniversary of the original release of The Terminator is coming up in 2024. Both sound like occasions that might warrant a new release.
With a 13-year gap between 2009’s Avatar and 2022’s Avatar: The Way of Water, fans of James Cameron were worried that they might not see another film from the filmmaker for another decade. Luckily for them, Cameron is already slated to direct two more films within the Avatar franchise: Avatar 3, which is scheduled for 2024, and Avatar 4, which is scheduled for 2026.
Although Landau sounded fairly confident in the interview, Disney/20th Century and Paramount have yet to confirm his statement, and an exact timeline and release date are not on the table as of yet. Still, Landau would not have commented if it wasn’t in the works. Fans should look for more details and a confirmation from the studios involved in the coming weeks.
