Avatar: The Way of Water Box Office Nears $1 Billion in Ticket Sales Worldwide

Avatar: The Way of Water box office collection is about to hit the $1 billion mark (about Rs. 8,285 crore). On Tuesday night, James Cameron’s much-delayed sequel raked in $955 million (roughly Rs. 7,909 crore) at the global box office, climbing to third position among the highest-grossing films of 2022 – tied with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, which earned $955.7 million (about Rs. 7,903 crore) worldwide during its theatrical release. The Avatar 2 breakdown sees an estimated $661.9 million (approximately Rs 5,481 crore) raised from markets outside the US, with China performing best despite rising COVID-19 cases in the region. In the United States and Canada, the new Avatar movie has grossed $293.2 million (about Rs. 2,428 crore).

As of Tuesday, India is among the top five non-US markets for Avatar: The Way of Water, ranked fifth with a contribution of $39.2 million (about Rs. 324 crore) to the global total. As noted above, China leads the non-US pack, collecting $104.5 million (approximately Rs. 866 crore) in ticket sales, which is a huge boost given that the region has notoriously banned several Hollywood releases in the area. Beyond that, the back-and-forth competition between France and Korea continues, with the former projecting $60.5m (roughly Rs. 501 crore), while the latter pulled in $55.4m. dollars (about Rs. 459 crore). Germany ranks fourth ahead of India, paying $41.5 million (about Rs. 344 crore).

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In just two weeks since its release, Avatar: The Way of Water has topped the box office for Black Panther: Wakanda Forever and Minions: The Rise of Gru. The project budgeted at $400 million (about Rs 3,314 crore) will soon hit $1 billion, competing with the only two films to pull off the feat this year.

Tom Cruise-directed Top Gun: Maverick grossed $1.4 billion (approx Rs. 11,598) at the worldwide box office, while Chris Pratt-directed Jurassic World Dominion is at $1.003 billion (approx Rs. 8 309 crore) despite negative reviews.

Avatar 2 still has a long way to go to break even, with Cameron believing the film should be the “third or fourth highest-grossing film in history.” That would be around $2 billion (roughly Rs. 16,568 crore) in global box office revenue – currently held by his own disaster romance film Titanicand Star Wars: The Force Awakens. These figures are not adjusted for inflation.

With those numbers, Avatar: The Way of Water is proving to be a successful draw for Disney and 20th Century Studios – coupled with the fact that there’s hardly any major competition in Hollywood until the release. ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania in February.

A previous report suggested that the film, in fact, exceeded expectations over the Christmas weekend in the US and Canada – grossing $29.5 million (roughly Rs. 244 crore) instead of the 21.5 million forecast (about Rs. 178 crore) – despite the harsh winter weather conditions in the region.

Avatar: The Way of Water is now in theaters worldwide. In India, Avatar 2 is available in English, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Tamil, and Telugu.

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