From slasher films to sci-fi thrillers to action-packed war movies, his films have impressed audiences time and again. In honor of this auteur, EW has revisited his career to deliver a ranked list of his best films.
Avatar
The first film in the Avatar series, directed and written by James Cameron, was released in 2009. It follows Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and his Na'vi family as they travel to Pandora, a moon of a gas giant located in the Alpha Centauri star system. The planet is rich in unobtanium, which the human Resources Development Administration plans to mine, but it's also populated by indigenous ten-foot-tall, blue Humanoid Aliens called Na'vi.
The Na'vi are distrustful of humans, but Grace Augustine (Sigourney Weaver) is determined to win their trust by understanding their relationship with nature and fostering a sense of harmony among them. She works at the head of the Avatar Program, which creates an avatar body from an individual's genetic code and transfers a human consciousness into it permanently.
Avatar's visual effects pushed the boundaries of technology and plunged viewers into an otherworldly oceanic landscape. The sequel, Avatar: The Way of Water, was a box office success and won four Academy Awards, including Best Visual Effects.
Avatar was made using groundbreaking motion capture technology that accurately portrays a person's movement and then transfers that movement to computer animation. It took years for the team to develop new techniques and get it right, but their efforts were rewarded.
ghosts of the abyss
In this sci-fi documentary, director James Cameron teamed with a team of scientists, historians and ocean explorers to conduct a deep-sea expedition to the Titanic wreck. Using specially designed underwater cameras and remotely operated vehicles, the crew gets close-ups of the ship's interior.
The film was released in 2003 and is available on DVD and Blu-ray 3D. It is one of the most comprehensive and informative documentaries on the Titanic wreckage.
It also provides a great overview of the ship's history and how it came to be in such a bad state. The footage is fascinating and it's hard not to feel a sense of remorse for those who lost their lives aboard.
Ghosts of the Abyss combines old 3D stereopticon slides, photographs and CGI images with actors in period dress recreating scenes that were on board before the disaster. The combination of the reconstructed images and real-life sage footage brings it all together in a stunningly realistic way.
It was directed by James Cameron, who was also behind the Titanic, and stars Bill Paxton, who narrates the film as part of a team of mariners, scientists, historians, and explorers. It is a fascinating, if not entirely accurate, look at the wreckage of the Titanic.
Aliens of the Deep
In Aliens of the Deep, director James Cameron (Ghosts of the Abyss, Titanic) teams up with scientists to explore the mid-ocean ridges, submerged chains of mountains that stretch across both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. These formations are teeming with strange life, some of which thrive in the absence of sunlight-dependent photosynthesis.
This documentary shows some amazing images of weird creatures that are found living in these subsurface environments. They include a translucent living ribbon that grows on a scalding hydrothermal vent, shrimp that thrive in the presence of volcanic smoke and an eel that has shell-like parts covered with bacteria.
While this documentary may not be as impressive as Cameron's previous Titanic feature, it is certainly an interesting and captivating document. It is also a very important exploration into the possibilities of life on other planets.
This is a film that's well worth seeing in the IMAX 3D format, where it was filmed, as well as on DVD. The film is accompanied by interactive online adventures and an engaging National Geographic companion book.
The Terminator
The Terminator is a post-apocalyptic movie set in 1984. A series of artificially intelligent machines called Skynet had become self-aware and launched a global nuclear war in an effort to destroy all humans. The resistance led by General John Connor saved the world from the machines' reign of terror.
The first movie in the Terminator franchise, it was a huge hit and received a wide acclaim for its story and special effects. It helped to establish the science fiction genre as a legitimate film subgenre and prompted other filmmakers to explore more hard sci-fi themes in their films.
In The Terminator, a robot sent back in time by Skynet (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is sent to kill Sarah Connor before she can have her child, a son who will lead the human resistance movement against Skynet and the machines. The Terminator initially mistook other women named "Sarah Connor" in the Los Angeles phone book for the real one and killed them, but he eventually realizes that he has been sent back in time to protect Sarah Connor from her future husband.
Titanic
One of the most popular movies of all time, Titanic is a story of love and loss. It was directed by James Cameron and starred Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio.
The film tells the story of two people from different social classes who fall in love on a fateful voyage of the Titanic. Despite the odds stacked against them, they are determined to live their lives to the fullest.
While the movie is a fictional tale, it does contain historical facts that help the audience understand the events of the real Titanic. For instance, a character, Captain Smith (Bernard Hill), who was on board the ship at the time of its sinking was depicted as an arrogant, bullheaded person.
Other characters included English businessman Joseph Bruce Ismay, who was chairman of White Star Line. He was painted as a villain in the film and his family has since sued Cameron and 20th Century Fox for the role he played in the movie.
Although Titanic is considered a classic, the film also contains some minor errors that have led to criticism. Some of these errors include the implication that Rose and Jack jumped off the ship.
True Lies
James Cameron's 1994 espionage thriller True Lies is one of the director's best movies. The film is full of action-packed sequences and comedy that are sure to keep viewers entertained until the very end.
The story centers on secret agent Harry Tasker (Arnold Schwarzenegger), who struggles to balance his dual life as a government spy and husband. His wife Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis) soon finds out about his double life, and their relationship is put to the test.
A baddie named Aziz (Art Malik) tries to steal a nuclear warhead from Harry and his wife. Luckily, Harry has two Marine Harrier Jump Jets at his disposal to stop him in his tracks.
During the third act of the movie, the heroes and villains are zipping around on the Seven Mile Bridge, a bridge that connects several sections of the Florida Keys. When the baddie attempts to smuggle out the nuclear weapon, Harry enlists the help of his trusty Marine Harrier Jump Jets, who blow up the bridge in one of the most epic moments in the movie.
Piranha 2: The Spawning
James Cameron is one of the most renowned filmmakers in history, responsible for such box office hits as The Terminator, Aliens, and The Abyss. His directing career started off with a watery horror film that may not be his best, but was certainly a launching point: Piranha 2: The Spawning (1981).
In this sequel to Joe Dante's 1978 film, genetically modified flying and swimming mutant piranhas terrorize a Caribbean resort where scuba-diving instructor Anne Kimbrough (Tricia O'Neil) and her scientist boyfriend Tyler Sherman (Steve Marachuk) spend a holiday. The resort's head owner laughs at their hair-brained theories of flying fish eating locals and spawning, but when they go to the morgue to investigate a diver's death, they uncover an incredibly gruesome secret.
While the film doesn't reach its full potential, it still contains plenty of suspense, amazing special effects, and a heroic performance by Lance Henriksen. It's a low-budget, Euro-influenced genre trash that's mainly meant to titillate with nudie shots and excite with silly special effects—and it does that well.
Xenogenesis
Before he was a household name with films like The Terminator, Aliens, or Avatar, James Cameron made Xenogenesis. It was a shoestring sci-fi short film that he made in his living room using mostly self-taught film techniques.
The story tells of a human and an android who search the galaxy for a planet where the cycle of creation can begin again. Both humans and machines have their own agendas that will bring them into conflict.
Butler focuses on the mingling of a human and alien cultures in her Xenogenesis series, which comprises Dawn, Adulthood Rites and Imago. The novels deal with a number of themes, including race, sexuality, and gender, as they explore the choices of an alien Oankali and the human Lilith Iyapo.
Butler’s novels offer powerfully insightful perspectives on the interaction of race, sex, and cultural identity. She also tackles a number of important themes in feminist and postcolonial theory, including the recuperation of normative family values and the naturalization of gendered social behavior.
