Jon Landau, Avatar & Titanic Producer Dead at 63

Jon Landau played a huge role in multiple 90s blockbusters.

By Aaron Perine

Avatar and Titanic producer Jon Landau is dead at the age of 63. The Wrap reports that the blockbuster filmmaker had cancer and was undergoing treatment. James Cameron was Landau's close collaborator for years. Together, the duo would rack-up multiple films to top the highest-grossing projects of all time list. Just Titanic and Avatar alone would be worth noting. But, there are hosts of others across his career. Landau was a vice president of Twentieth Century Fox back in the 1990s. He worked on fan-favorites like Die Hard 2, Honey I Shrunk the Kids and Dick Tracy. (A lot of Millennials are just realizing the presence this man had on their lives as film fans by going back through the catalog.)

Before the successes of Titanic and Avatar, Landau was born to film producers Ely and Edie Landau. The Hollywood fixture also went to USC's School of Cinematic arts during his younger days. On social media, one of the first people to memorialize Landau was Frances Fisher. Of course, she played a massive role in Titanic. Back in the 1990s, the staggering success of that film helped pave the way for the blockbuster theater landscape we enjoy today. The family has not issued a statement and ComicBook will provide updates as they become available.

Landau Was Working on The Avatar Series and So Much More

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(Photo:

Jon Landau was hard at work on a number of projects

- ComicBook)

The producer always seemed to be working on something related to one of these big franchises. Just last year, people were asking about the status of Alita: Battle Angel. Over the years, Landau's science fiction adventure has amassed something of a cult following among fans of the genre and the manga. In an era where everything is on the table for revisiting, Landau told ScreenRant that they were exploring that possibility as recently as last year. He always seemed passinate about the host of characters that he created with James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez.

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"We're working on it," Landau shared. "I think what we've learned from Avatar is how much more facial nuance and subtlety that we can get into characters that we want to be emotional and emote that are humanoid. Alita would not have been possible, but for what we did on Avatar. Avatar: Way of Water would not be what it is but what we did for Alita. And now let's put that back and give it back to Alita. We're talking to Robert and talking to Rosa and all is good.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family and friends in this time.

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