James Cameron first feature film since 1997's "Titanic". It is composed almost entirely of computer-generated animation, using a more-advanced version of the "performance capture" technique used by director Robert Zemeckis in "The Polar Express". James Cameron had written an 80-page scriptment for "Avatar" in 1995 and announced in 1996 that he would make the film after completing "Titanic". In December 2006, Cameron explained that the delay in producing the film since the 1990s had been to wait until the technology necessary to create his project was advanced enough, since at the time no studio would finance for the development of the visual
RMS Titanic in popular culture aims to gain a decisive American advantage in the Cold War by retrieving a stockpile of a fictitious ultra-rare mineral of military value, "byzanium", that the ship was supposedly carrying on her maiden voyage. The film, directed by Jerry Jameson, cost at least $40 million. It was the most expensive movie made up to that time but made only $10 million at the box office. Lew Grade, the producer, later remarked that it would have been "cheaper to lower the Atlantic". James Cameron's "Titanic" is the most commercially successful film about the ship's sinking. "Titanic" became the highest-grossing film in