Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (also spelled 20th Century Fox or just simply Fox) is the major film company that distributes the Avatar movies.

The studio is one of the six major American film studios. Located in the Century City area of Los Angeles, just west of Beverly Hills, the studio is a subsidiary of News Corporation, the media conglomerate owned by Rupert Murdoch.

The company was founded on December 28, 1934, as the result of a merger of two entities, Fox Film Corporation founded by William Fox in 1915, and Twentieth Century Pictures, begun in 1933 by Darryl F. Zanuck and company.

Scrat, from Ice Age, is considered as the mascot for 20th Century Fox.

Contents 1 Notable and popular movies/movie series 1.1 1960s 1.1.1 Cleopatra 1.1.2 The Sound of Music 1.2 1970s 1.2.1 Star Wars 1.3 1980s 1.3.1 Die Hard 1.4 1990s 1.4.1 Titanic 1.5 2000s 1.5.1 Ice Age 1.5.2 Avatar 1.5.3 Most Recent Films 1.6 2010s 1.6.1 Most Recent Films 1.6.2 Upcoming films 1.7 See also 1.8 Trivia 1.9 External Links and Bibliography

Notable and popular movies/movie series Edit

Note: Some films listed here were only founded and/or distrubuted by 20th Century Fox, not necessarily produced directly by the studio.

1960s Edit

Cleopatra Edit

Cleopatra is a 1963 film directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. The film starred Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Rex Harrison, Roddy McDowall and Martin Landau. The music score was by Alex North.

Cleopatra chronicles the struggles of Cleopatra VII, the young Queen of Egypt, to resist the imperialist ambitions of Rome.

Despite being a critical and commercial failure, it was a four-time Academy Award winner. The movie turned out to be very expensive, although it was the highest grossing film of the year, 20th only recovered half of the money spent for its production. 20th Century Fox's foundings were restored with the film The Sound of Music.

The Sound of Music Edit

The Sound of Music is a 1965 musical film directed by Robert Wise and starring Julie Andrews in the lead role. The film is based on the Broadway musical The Sound of Music, with songs written by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II, and with the musical book written by the writing team of Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse.

The musical originated with the book The Story of the Trapp Family Singers by Maria von Trapp. It contains many popular songs, including "Edelweiss", "My Favorite Things", "Climb Ev'ry Mountain", "Do-Re-Mi", "Sixteen Going on Seventeen", and "The Lonely Goatherd", as well as the title song.

The movie version was filmed on location in Salzburg, Austria and Bavaria in Southern Germany, and also at the 20th Century Fox Studios in California. It won a total of five Academy Awards including Best Picture in 1965 and is one of the most popular musicals ever produced.

1970s Edit

Star Wars Edit

Star Wars is a space opera (sci-fi/romance) film series conceived by George Lucas. The first film was released in May 25, 1977, by 20th Century Fox and became a worldwide phenomenon, spawning two immediate sequels, released in 3 year intervals. Sixteen years later, a prequel triology was released, with the final film "Revenge of the Sith" being released in 2005.

1980s Edit

Die Hard Edit

Die Hard is a 1988 action film directed by John McTiernan and written by Jeb Stuart and Steven E. de Souza. It is based on a 1979 novel by Roderick Thorp titled Nothing Lasts Forever, itself a sequel to the book The Detective.

It stars Bruce Willis as the NYPD officer John McClane and Alan Rickman as terrorist thief Hans Gruber.

A critical and commercial success, Die Hard propelled Willis' film career and established Rickman as a popular portrayer of villains in American film. The film also started the Die Hard series.

1990s Edit

Titanic Edit

Titanic is a 1997 American romantic drama film directed, written, co-produced and co-edited by James Cameron about the sinking of the RMS Titanic. It stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson and Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater, two members of different social classes who fall in love aboard the ill-fated maiden voyage of the ship. The main characters and the central love story are fictional, but some characters (such as members of the ship's passengers and crew) are based on real historical figures. Gloria Stuart plays the elderly Rose, who narrates the film in a modern day framing device.

The film was originally to be released on July 2, 1997, but post-production delays pushed back the film's release to December 19, 1997. Upon release, the film turned out to be an enormous critical and commercial success, winning eleven Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It became the highest-grossing film of all time, with a worldwide total of over $1.8 billion (it is the sixth-highest grossing in North America once adjusted for inflation).

2000s Edit

Ice Age Edit

Ice Age is a 2002 American computer-animated film created by Blue Sky Studios and released by 20th Century Fox in 2002. The film was originally to be animated in 2-D by Fox Animation Studios, and will be directed by Don Bluth (director of An American Tail, The Land Before Time, All Dogs Go to Heaven and Rock-a-Doodle) and Gary Goldman (co-director of Anastasia and Titan A.E.), but the rise of computer-animation and the failure of Titan A.E. destroyed Fox's traditional-animation division, transferring their duties to Chris Wedge and Carlos Saldanha for Blue Sky.

Avatar Edit

Main article: Avatar (film series)

Most Recent Films Edit

• Avatar (first movie with new logo)
• Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakuel

2010s Edit

Most Recent Films Edit

• Tooth Fairy (last movie with 1994 CGI logo)
• Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief
• My Name Is Khan (with Fox Searchlight Pictures)
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid
• Date Night

Upcoming films Edit

• Marmaduke - June 4, 2010
• The A-Team - June 11, 2010
• Knight and Day - June 25, 2010
• Predators - July 7, 2010
• Ramona and Beezus - July 23, 2010
• Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps - September 24, 2010
• Unstoppable - November 12, 2010
• Love and Other Drugs - November 24, 2010
• The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader - December 10, 2010
• Gulliver's Travels - December 22, 2010
• Rio - April 8, 2011

See also Edit

• Lightstorm Entertainment
• Avatar (film)
• James Cameron

Trivia Edit

• The new 20th Century Fox logo was produced by Blue Sky Studios, the creator of Ice Age.
• Despite showing rather poor sales from movies like Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief and The Tooth Fairy, 20th Century Fox manages to dominate Q1 sales of 2010 solely from year-over holdovers as a result of Avatar, which accounted for more than half of the company's sales.

External Links and Bibliography Edit

• Fox website
• 20th Century Fox article in Wikipedia
• Die Hard article on Wikipedia
• Cleopatra article on Wikipedia
• Star Wars article on Wikipedia
• The Sound of Music article on Wikipedia
• Ice Age article on Wikipedia

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