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James Cameron
Director/Writer/Producer/Editor
JAMES CAMERON was born in
Kapuskasing,
Ontario,
Canada, and grew up in Niagara Falls. In 1971,
he moved
to Brea, California,
where he studied physics at Fullerton
College
while working as a machinist
and, later, a truck driver. In
1978,
setting his sights on a career in
film, Cameron raised money
from
a consortium of dentists to produce
a short film in 35mm. He
served
as producer, director, co-writer, editor,
miniature builder,
cinematographer
and special effects supervisor.
In 1980,his
work on the short film led to a position at Roger
Corman's
NewWorld Pictures on "Battle Beyond the Stars." In the
frenzied
world of low-budget
guerrilla filmmaking, Cameron found
a home
on the production where
he could again wear many hats:
miniature
builder, model unit DP and matte
painter among them.Most
importantly,he
became the art director of the picture's
main unit and
found
the energy of the set exhilarating.
Determined
to direct, Cameron parlayed his production designer job
on a
subsequent
Corman film,"Galaxy of Terror,"into a stint as second
unit
director.When
the production fell behind schedule,Corman asked
him
to shoot
some dialogue scenes with principal cast.Finding the work
with
actors exciting,Cameron
began preparing a script for himself to
direct.
Cameron
wrote "The Terminator" in 1982,hoping to couple his effects
and
design experience
with a low-budget high-impact vehicle that
could
find
independent
financing. After two lean years, Cameron
finally
brought
the film
before cameras
as a Hemdale/HBO
co-production
released
by Orion. Though
costing
only $6 million, the
film
received international
acclaim, appeared
on numerous
10 best
lists
(including Time
magazine) and made over
$80 million worldwide.
While
waiting for financing for "The Terminator," Cameron wrote two
scripts
to keep
busy. In a three-month period he wrote (with Sylvester
Stallone)
"Rambo: First
Blood Part II" and "Aliens," the sequel to the
1979
science fiction classic "Alien."
"Rambo II" later became an
international
mega-hit grossing over $250 million
globally.
After
the success of "The Terminator," Cameron agreed to direct
"Aliens"
and plunged
into production in 1985. Shot in England and
released
in the summer of
1986, "Aliens" received seven Academy
Award®
nominations, including Best
Actress for Sigourney Weaver.
The
film won Oscars® for Best Visual Effects
and Best Sound
Effects.
"Aliens"
became one of the most successful R-rated
films
of all
time, grossing
over $180 million worldwide.
In 1988-89,
Cameron wrote and directed his next project, the
underwater
epic
"The Abyss,"
which required 18 months to complete.
It starred
Ed Harris,
Michael
Biehn and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio,
and
received four Academy
Award®
nominations. "The Abyss" blazed
a new
trail for visual effects
withthe creation
of photo-realistic
computer
animation. It won the Oscar®
for Best Visual
Effects and
grossed
$110 million worldwide.
Cameron
next co-wrote "Point Break" with Kathryn Bigelow, who
directed.
He
was executive
producer of the film which made over
$100
worldwide and
topped video
rental charts for five weeks.
As writer,
producer and director of 1991's "Terminator 2:Judgment
Day,"
Cameron
achieved a new high-water mark for action and visual
effects.
Building
on techniques pioneered in "The Abyss," he worked
with
ILM to create
computer animated images for this visual tour de
force
which came to
be known
globally as "T2" and earned over $500
million
in worldwide grosses,close
to $1 billion with worldwide
ancillary
revenues.
In addition
to box office success, "T2" received six Academy
Award®
nominations
of which it won four: Best Makeup, Sound,
Visual
Effects and
Sound Effects
Editing. It also received the
Ray
Bradbury Award for Dramatic
Screenwriting,
five Saturn
Awards
from the Academy of Science Fiction,
Fantasy
and
Horror
and six MTV Movie Awards. "T2"also won the People's
Choice
Award and took honors at the Video Software Dealers
Awards
and the
first annual Laser Disc Awards.
In 1994,
Cameron wrote, produced and directed the action-comedy
"True
Lies," starring
Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis.
The
flagship
film for
Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment and the
first
featurewith
special
effects
by his own effects studio, Digital
Domain,
"True Lies"
grossed
over $365
million in worldwide box
office.The
following
year, Lightstorm
presented "Strange
Days,"
directed
by Kathryn Bigelow from a
screenplay by Cameron and
Jay
Cocks. Cameron produced with Steven Charles
Jaffe.
Also
in 1995, the National Association of Theatre Owners, the same
organization
which awarded James Cameron the Director of the Year
Award
earlier
in his career, presented him with the Producer of the
Year
Award.In
addition,the
Laser Disc Association presented him with
the
Laser Beam
Award for
selling 500,000 units of his critically-
acclaimed
laser discs.
Now,James
Cameron had wroted,produced,directed an dramatic film
which
has been
awarded 11 Award Academy (Best Picture Award),
TITANIC.
This is
the film
which gross more than 1 billion in the box-
office.This
dramatic
film gave a perfect presentation because
Cameron
itself have
done alot of work on TITANIC.
Cameron work out in his Titanic scrap work
James Cameron's Interviews
On the mindset of 1912
On faith in technology
Quicktime
3.4 mb
Quicktime
3.1 mb
On re-creating the sinking On Titanic
as metaphor
Quicktime
1.1 mb
Quicktime
1.2 mb
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