Only three weeks after its release, Avatar, the 3D sci-fi fantasy directed by James Cameron, has overtaken Star Wars to become the third biggest grossing film ever on the US domestic box office charts.
Avatar, at $500m (£308m) the most costly movie in history , took $41.3m in the US at the weekend, raising its total to $491.8m. Worldwide, it has grossed $1.5bn. This weekend it also became the most successful Imax feature ever.
The speed with which Avatar has hurtled up the charts has astonished the cinematic world. Star Wars took years and several reissues to take in $460.9m in the US. Star Wars fans, however, can point out that their favourite is well ahead of Avatar in terms of tickets sold and Avatar has streaked ahead because of today's higher admission prices.
Avatar is now homing in on the second spot, The Dark Knight, part of the Batman franchise.
After that, Cameron has only himself to catch. His Titanic, which raked in $600m in the US, holds the top slot. Titanic is also top of the heap worldwide, taking in $1.8bn in 1997 and 1998. On Wednesday, Avatar increased its global take to $1.13bn to surpass the $1.12bn notched up by The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, according to Box Office Mojo.
Avatar is set in the year 2154 on the distant planet Pandora, which is being colonised by Earthlings in need of a rare mineral called unobtainium, a source of energy that alone can save our planet from extinction. Some commentators have interpreted the film as a metaphor for the destruction of indigenous people – they are slender blue-tinted natives in Avatar – by colonial powers.
Despite its popularity, critics have been cutting about Cameron's work. One called it "overlong, dramatically two-dimensional, smug and simplistic. It preaches a sermon about our duty towards the preservation of the environment while leaving the biggest trail of carbon footprints since Godzilla trampled New York."