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Avatar sets two Blu-ray records: most illegal downloads, most bought discs

Avatar sets two Blu-ray records: most illegal downloads, most bought discs
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It smashed Box Office records worldwide to become the highest grossing film in history, now James Cameron's Avatar is setting new benchmarks in the Blu-ray market. Around 1.5 million Blu-ray discs were snapped-up on the first day of release in the U.S. - more than previous record holder The Dark Knight - and that's just the 2D version, without special features. The Blu-ray release also triggered an avalanche of illegal downloads, with the sci-fi epic now well on its way to becoming the most pirated Blu-ray film ever.

Downloads on BitTorrent reportedly reached 200,000 in the first four days after the Blu-ray release. TorrentFreak points out that countries where the Blu-ray release was later than the U.S. (U.K. and Australia) made up a relatively high proportion of the illegal downloads.

In stores, combined DVD and Blu-ray sales where estimated at more the 4 million units.

A second 2D release with bonus features is expected in November and the full box of chocolates - for those with 3D Blu-ray players - will arrive early in 2011.

Given its incredible success to date, the film certainly won't do any damage to the uptake of 3D in the home.

Via: ABC News.

9 comments
9 comments
Gadgeteer
Blech. Overhyped, awful film. I won\'t buy the Blu-ray and I wouldn\'t even download it for free. Just not worth watching. I\'d rather watch \"How to Train Your Dragon\" any day. That had a much better, less depressing story and characters you can care about.
Ian MacEachern
I agree with May of 76. Avatar was a three hour bag of crap.
William H Lanteigne
Right: the biggest box-office hit of all time was a bag of crap. So were all the previous all-time movie hits. Moviegoers must be awfully stupid...
Or, maybe it\'s just you two-
Gadgeteer
\"Moviegoers must be awfully stupid...\"
You said it, not me. It never occurred to you that much of the attraction was to the novelty of 3D for today\'s audiences? Nor that the high box office is at least in part due to the exorbitant ticket prices in the 3D theaters? Popularity is never a good indicator of quality. Most professional critics lambasted the film for its utterly unoriginal and predictable plot. For all of its 3D spectacle, the characters were completely two-dimensional. Without the 3D aspect, the CGI wasn\'t top notch, never looking truly realistic in terms of texture or motion. In a few years, when the novelty of 3D has worn off, people will admit that this really wasn\'t a good movie.
marshall91t
Agreed, if you dont like somthing fair enough, there is no point bitching about it. I\'m sure your also aware that \'How to Train your Dragon\' is actually based on a book, I\'m sure the film is much better thoug....
Gadgeteer
@marshall91t,
Well, by that token, what gives you the right to tell others to shut up? If you don\'t like their opinions, fair enough. But there is no point bitching about them. Maybe you would like to live in a world where you can worship James Cameron as God\'s gift to Hollywood, but reality is somewhat different.
William H Lanteigne
\"Without the 3D aspect, the CGI wasn\'t top notch, never looking truly realistic in terms of texture or motion. In a few years, when the novelty of 3D has worn off, people will admit that this really wasn\'t a good movie.\"
I haven\'t seen it in 3D yet. It was playing in 2D in the theater where we watched it. I didn\'t go to critique the movie, I went to have a good time with my son. We both enjoyed it, and I think it was worth the price of admission. We may go to see it again at the Imax theater the next time it plays there. I understand it spoils your intent, but I\'m sure we\'ll have a good time anyway.
Jon Shurtleff
The higher the profile of the the film, the more people love to wag their tongues about its flaws. They sat through it didn't they?
Yeah, the story was simple and the characters were not deep and complex. But they were good enough. Because it's science fiction and *meant to entertain* not be high drama. Like Titanic the story is not great. I can skip the first half, but the portatrayal of the sinking is amazing.
And to suggest that the CGI was not anything but absolutely, cutting edge, state-of-the art is absurd. My gave me the collectors edition recently and to be honest, I postponed watching it because the story was not that strong but once I did, once again I absolutely dazzled by not only the quality of the special effects, the textures, the blades of grass blown in the downdraft of a helicopter, etc. but the artistry of creating such a convincing world.
I can watch it over and over again and speed it up and slow it down and go frame by frame and always see more amazing detail I hadn't seen before.
I can only imagine how much it will have improved by the next iteration.
Fusiontek
That is one of the problems with this movie.
It was supposed to be science fiction and there was practically no science fiction in it with very little about the futuristic technology that was supposed to exist.
Sure, it was supposed to be on another planet with new and different flora and fauna. And the indigenous sentient beings were not humans. But there was nothing about how the ship got there or what they used for fuel. All they showed was the ship at the planet and the humans landing in a shuttle craft.
James Cameron knows how to tell a story well, he did a fantastic job of telling this one.
But the story, while told quite well was garbage because it was nothing but an attack on the ideas of business and on the military with the message that both were evil, and run by greedy idiots.
If you like anti capitalist propaganda films then this one should be at the top of your list and plenty of people in the world love such tripe, which is why it did so well at the box office.
If you really like good science fiction then "A Sound of Thunder" was far better, even though it too was quite preachy about greedy capitalists misusing technology. At least it revolved far more around the technology itself and showed how science and technology and even capitalism, could be used for good. They were not made out to be inherently and irredeemably evil, in and of themselves.
If you don't care about how old a movie is, then another excellent film with a lot of actual science fiction in it, was Forbidden Planet. I have watched both of those movies multiple times and had my fill of Avatar after a single viewing: Despite my having purchased the DVD box set expanded edition, to do so.