Movies Overshadowed by "Avatar" Quiz

Answer: Titanic

Like "Titanic", "Avatar" was a born juggernaut. "Titanic" was not only the top-grossing film from 1997, but the top-grossing film ever released. Starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet (amongst many others) the movie followed a love story during the sinking of the Titanic in April 1912. It not only became a big hit with filmgoers, but it also became one of the biggest Oscar winners. It took in eleven awards (including Best Picture) with fourteen nominations. Overall it made $1,843,201,268 in the box office. The next best movie in 1997 was "The Lost World: Jurassic Park"; it took in only a third of that total.

"Titanic" was also the most expensive film of its time. Although "Avatar" surpassed the costs by $37 million twelve years later, two movies were actually made for more money in earlier years: "Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End" and "Spider-Man 3" (both in 2007).

Answer: Harry Potter

"Avatar" was released about five months after "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince", the sixth film in the "Harry Potter" film series (of eight). This particular sequel continued Harry's story at Hogwarts and preceded the inevitable war against Lord Voldemort. Although this film in the series took in a total of $974,201,682 in the international box office, it was the third-lowest total of the eight films. The highest, the final installment of the series ("Deathly Hallows Part II") saw the most money come in.

Compared to "Avatar's" inevitable two billion plus total, this one "Harry Potter" film's gross may seem dwarfed but the series as a whole has earned upwards of $8,000,000,000 overall, and that isn't a bad total itself.

Answer: The Hurt Locker

"The Hurt Locker", directed by Kathryn Bigelow, followed the story of a bomb squad in Iraq and, after its release in 2009, it won 'Best Picture' and 'Best Director' at the 82nd Academy Awards ceremony. The movie starred Jeremy Renner and it took home an additional four Oscars that night. Bigelow was once married to James Cameron, the director of "Avatar" and she also directed the 1987 vampire film "Near Dark" and the 1991 action film "Point Break". The couple ended their relationship in 1991. Aside from beating Cameron at the Oscars, Bigelow also became the first female recipient of the 'Best Director Oscar'.

Because "Avatar" swept the major award at the Golden Globes, many considered it a front-runner for the main prize at the Oscars. Cameron also took home the Globe for 'Best Director' at the same event.

"Inglourious Basterds" was directed by Quentin Tarantino, "Up in the Air" was directed by Jason Reitman, and "Precious" was made by Lee Daniels. All three films were up for 'Best Picture' in both ceremonies.

Answer: The Dark Knight

Taking advantage of Earth Day sales, the "Avatar" home release was slated for April 2010 in most countries. In its first day of sales, "Avatar" sold one and a half million Blu-Ray units breaking a record set by "The Dark Knight" over a year before. A little over a year later, "Avatar's" DVD sales alone reached over ten million total units.

The previous record-holder for home media sales was "The Dark Knight", the second in Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy beginning with "Batman Begins". "The Dark Knight" was critically acclaimed and it starred Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne, Aaron Eckhart as Two-Face/Harvey Dent, and the late Heath Ledger as The Joker (a role for which he won a posthumous Oscar). In this movie, Batman faced off against both evil-doers.

Answer: Gladiator

James Horner has been nominated for Oscars on many different occasions and said films include "House of Sand and Fog" (2003), "A Beautiful Mind" (2001), "Braveheart" (1995), "Apollo 13" (1995), "Field of Dreams" (1989), "Aliens" (1986), "An American Tail" (1986), "Titanic" (1997), and "Avatar" (2009). His first Oscar wins came from "Titanic". "Avatar" was actually bested in the 'Best Original Score' category by "Up!" at its ceremony.

"Gladiator" was scored by Hans Zimmer and it was nominated back in 2000. It lost to "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon". Zimmer has also worked on scores for films including "The Lion King" (for which he won the Oscar), "Inception", and "The Dark Knight". "Gladiator" followed the rise of the titular gladiator, played by Russell Crowe.

Answer: Up!

"Up!", released by Disney and Pixar in 2009, was nominated for 'Best Picture', like many others, and lost to "Avatar". In the box office it took in over $730,000,000 becoming Pixar's second-most popular film to date (though it would be surpassed by "Toy Story 3" in 2010). As you can see, that number did not beat two billion in the box office.

"Up!" was an interesting movie about an old man, a balloon house, a rotund little boy, an odd bird, and a dog with a speech collar. The movie, directed by Pete Docter, won two Oscars.

According to James Cameron, production on "Avatar" couldn't start until it did (he'd been planning it for over a decade) because the technology to facilitate the film did not yet exist. Upon its release, it appeared in 2D, 3D, Real3D, IMAX 3D, '4D', and other forms.

Answer: Star Trek

"Star Trek" was the major reboot of the original film series and it appeared in theaters in mid-2009. This movie followed the crew of Captain Kirk in their earliest mission. It was quite well-received, taking in nearly $400,000,000 overall and receiving good reviews. Starring Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Karl Urban, and "Avatar's" Zoe Saldana, the movie won an Oscar for 'Best Makeup', a category which "Avatar" was not a part of (due to its visual graphics).

"Avatar" took home a total of ten Saturn Awards during its ceremonies as well as additional one for James Cameron for his visionary contributions to the genre as a whole. "Avatar" won the award in every category for which it was nominated at this particular event.

Answer: Sherlock Holmes

"Sherlock Holmes" was a box office success and Robert Downey Jr. would later win the 'Best Actor - Musical or Comedy' Golden Globe for his role. Directed by Guy Ritchie, the movie followed Sherlock Holmes as he solved the mystery behind some London murders. Overall the film took in over $500,000,000 in the box office and a sequel was greenlit for 2011. It was also nominated for two Oscars losing one to "Avatar".

On Christmas Day 2009, the movie premiered to a healthy $24.8 million total to "Avatar's" $23.5 million take. However, by the end of the weekend, "Avatar" regained its footing to take in over $75,000,000 to "Holmes'" $66,000,000 despite the fact that "Holmes" was in more theaters.

Answer: The Terminal

Starring Tom Hanks, "The Terminal" was a Stephen Spielberg movie set in a New York City airport terminal. When Hanks' character, Viktor Navorski, was unable to enter New York but could not return to his home country he was forced to live in the airport. Navorski's home country was the fictional Krakozhia, suspected to be an offshoot of Russia. The language spoken in the film is a dialect/style of Bulgarian. A national anthem was written for the film.

The other films listed had languages made for them as well! "The Fifth Element" (1997) featured a divine language spoken by Milla Jovovich, "Stargate" had the language of the Ancients in its 1994 film and subsequent TV shows, and "The Interpreter" (2005) featured a language known as Ku.

Na'vi is a fairly complex language in itself. Developed specifically for the citizens of Pandora, it was crafted by language scholar Paul Frommer. Created over the course of several months, many actors auditioning for roles were required to speak in Na'vi during script readings.

Answer: FernGully: The Last Rainforest

Released in 1992, the movie also featured the voices of Christian Slater and Tim Curry. In this film, a group of fairies in an Australian rainforest fought to prevent a logging company and an evil spirit known as Hexxus from destroying their home. After shrinking one of the human loggers, Crysta fell in love with him and they set out to save their ecosystem.

Of course, "Avatar" was quite similar to this premise in that a character became one with the Na'vi and decided to work with them to save their precious ecosystem from getting mined for its resources. Unsurprisingly, many believed that "Avatar" also took elements from Disney's "Pocahontas", Kevin Costner's "Dances With Wolves" and the Tom Cruise film "The Last Samurai".