Slashfilm recently caught up with Avatar producer John Landau who was attending E3 promoting the Avatar video game. Landau commented on the running time saying, “definitely over two and a half hours.” Film Crew T-Shirts is saying that Cameron’s current cut is one hundred and eighty nine minutes long. Avatar is set to be shown in IMAX which cant show films that are over hundred and sixty minute films.
One hundred and eighty two minutes is obviously a hefty running time, but the story does sound epic enough that a running time at this length may be needed. It will be interesting to see how this will be shown in IMAX. I cant imagine James Cameron cutting his cut down by nearly forty minutes just so it could be shown in IMAX. One thing that does worries me actually is whether or not one can stand 3D up to that long, 3D has never given me a headache, but it does do that to a lot of people who wouldn’t be so keen at dealing with that for over three hours. Hopefully in the end Cameron’s cut is released which is probably the best cut, and I cant imagine how delighted he must be having final cut.