James Cameron, director of “Avatar: The Way of Water,” revealed he cut 10 minutes of gun violence from the Avatar sequel because it made his stomach feel sick and that he did not to want to “fetishize the gun” anymore.
According to Variety, the iconic director claimed that given the gun violence in the U.S., he no longer wants to “fetishize the gun” in his action scenes.
In an interview with Esquire Middle East, the famed filmmaker commented, “I actually cut about 10 minutes of the movie targeting gunplay action.”
“I wanted to get rid of some of the ugliness, to find a balance between light and dark. You have to have conflict, of course,” Cameron added. “Violence and action are the same thing, depending on how you look at it. This is the dilemma of every action filmmaker, and I’m known as an action filmmaker.”
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The filmmaker also touched on his past films, like “The Terminator,” stating, “I look back on some films that I’ve made, and I don’t know if I would want to make that film now. I don’t know if I would want to fetishize the gun, like I did on a couple of ‘Terminator’ movies 30-plus years ago, in our current world. What’s happening with guns in our society turns my stomach.”
“I’m happy to be living in New Zealand where they just banned all assault rifles two weeks after that horrific mosque shooting a couple of years ago,” Cameron added.
Cameron’s comments raised interest as to how his future films will be developed, especially given the filmmaker’s latest headline teasing a new “Terminator” movie.
Cameron revealed this latest Hollywood gossip on the “Smartless” podcast, commenting, “If I were to do another ‘Terminator’ film and maybe try to launch that franchise again, which is in discussion, but nothing has been decided, I would make it much more about the AI side of it than bad robots gone crazy.”
