Banking on return of blue magic

Making Avatar’s sequels in New Zealand would be a win for Weta and Wellington, reports James Weir.

Sir Peter Jackson’s Weta Digital is expecting that film director James Cameron will make Avatar 2 and 3 in Wellington, film industry sources say. It is a job that could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars and employ hundreds of people for several years, but it is not yet a done deal.

Confidence that Cameron would choose Weta and Wellington again to make Avatar 2 and 3 rose when the director recently bought a farm in Wairarapa.

Cameron having a base here was seen as a ‘‘positive’’ sign that his decision would favour Weta. In the past, Cameron had expressed a desire to shoot the sequels here, but a final decision has yet to come from his company Lightstorm Entertainment.

About $362 million was spent in New Zealand making the first Avatar 3-D film, employing hundreds of digital animators in Wellington for years on the complex computer-generated images.

Avatar employed more than 1500 people in New Zealand and injected about $100m into the Wellington economy alone. As well as the digital animation, Weta did the conceptual design, specialty costumes, props and even weapons for the film.

Two Weta sources said they hoped Wellington would be picked. ‘‘Fingers crossed,’’ one highly placed source said.

The other said Cameron’s move to the farm, which is about 15 to 20 minutes by helicopter from Weta’s base near Wellington airport, gave greater confidence.

Film Wellington manager Delia Shanly said they had heard the rumours of Avatar sequels being made in Wellington, but there was nothing concrete.

‘‘It would be absolutely amazing to have them back here,’’ she said. ‘‘It put so many millions into the Wellington and New Zealand economy. It would just be amazing (to get parts 2 and 3).’’ While Cameron’s decision to buy a farm here did not make the decision a certainty, ‘‘it is not unpromising – it is a very good sign’’.

In another good sign for Weta, US director Steven Spielberg this week confirmed that Peter Jackson would direct the second Tintin movie in a planned trilogy. Spielberg said Jackson would go into production on the Tintin sequel as soon as he finished work on The Hobbit films.

Released last year, the first Tintin film has already made US$371M (NZ$447M) worldwide.

Avatar also got $52m in tax breaks from Kiwi taxpayers despite it becoming the biggest selling movie of all time, making more than US$2.8 billion for Twentieth Century Fox studios.

That is part of Fox Entertainment Group, in turn owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation.

In the 2010 June year, Twentieth Century Fox made a US$1.35B profit on the back of Avatar and Ice Age. Some estimates put Avatar’s absolute profits for Fox at more than US$1.15B, even more profitable than Cameron’s other blockbuster, Titanic.

Shanly said the tax breaks were vital for the film sector to lure film-makers to New Zealand.

New Zealand was also attractive for non-unionised labour and skilled staff at companies.

‘‘If we didn’t have a 15 per cent tax break we wouldn’t even begin a conversation with these [overseas] film-makers,’’ she said.

New Zealand was never going to be the $2 Shop of film-making and should not try to be a cheap destination.

But people like Cameron were attracted here by highly skilled people who could deliver.

‘‘We have a huge reputation for our talent and they can make something happen, even it has never been done before,’’ Shanly said.

Part of the production of Avatar was based in Wellington, including the world-class facilities at Stone Street Studios, Weta Workshop and Weta Digital. The three groups are jointly owned by Sir Peter Jackson, Richard Taylor and Jamie Selkirk.

There was also live action shooting in other parts of the city for Avatar.

The film was seen as a technological breakthrough by Weta Digital, following on from the vis- ual effects work in Jackson’s King Kong and The Lord of the Rings films.

For Avatar, Weta used highdefinition video cameras attached to an actor’s face to get highly realistic facial animation for the characters in the science fiction film.

The fact that Weta had delivered in the first Avatar and helped make Cameron pots of money were seen as factors in Wellington’s favour.

Making the sequels would also add to the continuity of the movies, and maintain Cameron’s vision for the world of Avatar, set on the fictional planet Pandora.

It would also slot in nicely to the Weta work schedule, after the two Hobbit films are completed over the next two years. However, Wellington could be over-ruled by a producer who was looking at the bottom line, possibly seeking bigger tax breaks elsewhere. Fox did not respond to requests for comment about Avatar. Reports last year also cast some doubt about a return to Wellington for the Avatar sequels.

Cameron and his team have moved to the MBS Media Campus where Pirates of the Caribbean and Iron Man were made. Avatar producer Jon Landau said in June last year that the campus would be the ‘‘heart of the next two Avatars’’.

But at the time Weta boss Joe Letteri said Wellington was still in the running for Avatar 2 and 3, and that Cameron had visited Weta to discuss its possible involvement. MBS Media could be used for performance capture with other work done in Wellington.

Weta is the second largest digital animation company in the world just behind US giant Pixar, with about 900 staff now working on two Hobbit movies and visual effects for Superman – Man of Steel.

The first Hobbit film should be finished at the end of this year and the second the year after. The Superman film is slated for 2013, as well as another film, Elysium, with Weta doing work on conceptual designs and physical effects.

Elysium is another science fiction film set on a planet in the distant future, written and directed by Neill Blomkamp, who also directed District 9. Elysium stars Matt Damon, Jodie Foster and the main production is being done in Canada. The follow-up Avatar movies are expected to be shot back to back and released in December 2014 and 2015 respectively, according to reports last year which quoted Cameron saying he was working on the two scripts.

However, the first film was long delayed and some international references suggest Avatar 2 will come out in 2016, not 2014.

Given the huge amount of work and time taken to produce the first Avatar film a decision on where to make it could be made in coming months.

The first Avatar is the biggestselling movie of all time, unadjusted for inflation, making about US$2.8B worldwide. Cameron’s Titanic, made in 1997, grossed US$1.8B, at the time also the biggest-selling movie.

Despite the huge success of Avatar, which earned US$350M for Cameron alone, New Zealand taxpayers kicked in almost $53m to make it.

Avatar received a total of $52.9m from the Large Budget Screen Production Grant based on qualifying spending of $362.8m, according to Film Commission figures.

The grant was given to the film production company 880 Productions, part of the Fox

‘‘Avatar was ‘the most prominent film in the Western world, so having that based in Wellington, showed that Wellington could perform’.’’ Delia Shanly

studios empire.

Weta Digital’s Letteri was travelling overseas and could not be reached for comment.

A Weta spokesman in Wellington said there was ‘‘not much we can say’’. The decision was up to Cameron’s production company: ‘‘They have all the cards.’’

Letteri is expected to attend the Oscars on February 26, where he is nominated for a visual effects award for work on Rise of the Planet of the Apes.

It is the sixth Oscar nomination for Letteri, who was also won the award for Avatar in 2009 and King Kong as well as two Lord of the Rings films by Jackson. He was nominated but did not win for I, Robot.

Meanwhile, Shanly said having Cameron living in New Zealand would bring the film world closer to Wellington, given his international connections.

The first Avatar film did not involve much location shooting – most work was done in a studio.

Avatar was ‘‘the most prominent film in the Western world, so having that based in Wellington, showed that Wellington could perform’’, Shanly said.

It was the first major international film done in Wellington that was not made by Jackson.

Cameron was a director at the top of his creative game who had chosen Weta to create a ‘‘groundbreaking’’ vision of the science fiction world of Pandora.

‘‘He chose Wellington. That is a real stamp of approval,’’ Shanly said.