Avatar Good So Far, but No New Moon

Cameron's latest sci-fi epic pulls in $3.5 million at midnight screening, falling far short of vampire sequel's recent record

James Cameron's blue man group's got nothing on Edward Cullen.

Avatar raked in a solid if not spectacular $3.5 million at midnight screenings, according to preliminary estimates. That's far short of the "absolutely freakish" record $26.3 million generated by New Moon's witching-hour debut last month.

But like Titanic, which started off just as slow but sailed into the record books as the highest-grossing film of all time, the jury's still way out for Cameron's budget-bursting follow-up.

Unspooling in more than 3,400 theaters in both 3-D and 2-D formats with a running time of almost two hours and 40 minutes and garnering near universal rave reviews, Avatar is expected to rake in upwards of $75 million to $80 million its opening weekend, according to early estimates.

Most prognosticators expect it to make a return on its eye-popping budget of $250 million-plus, but no one is quite sure where it will land on the all-time box-office list.

This much we know...it's got $247 million to go.