James Cameron opens up on budget cuts for ‘Avatar’ movies

James Cameron is hoping to cut costs for his next Avatar movies.

The 71-year-old filmmaker released the third film, Avatar: Fire and Ash, last year and while he still has plans for the fourth and fifth movies in the franchise, they haven't officially been green lit but he is working on a way to make them “in half the time for two thirds of the cost” of the previous installments.

He added on The Empire Film Podcast, “After that, I’m like Roadrunner going off a cliff. I’ll be doing some writing, I’ve got a number of projects I’m cooking. And Avatar 4 and 5 are still floating out there.”

“We’re gonna be looking at some new technologies to try and do them more efficiently, because they’re hideously expensive and take a long time. I want to do them in half the time for two thirds of the cost, that’s my metric. And so, it’s going to take us a year or so to figure out how to do that. And in the meantime, I’ll be writing and probably be doing a couple of other things,” Cameron added.

With the fate of the film series up in the air, the Titanic filmmaker previously promised to hold a press conference to reveal the plot details of Avatar 4 if the franchise is cancelled.

He told Entertainment Weekly, “I don’t know if the saga goes beyond this point. I hope it does. But, you know, we prove that business case every time we go out… If we don’t get to make 4 and 5, for whatever reason, I’ll hold a press conference and I’ll tell you what we were gonna do. How’s that?”

Disney currently has Avatar 4 on its calendar for 2029, with Avatar 5 set for release in 2031.