First post from the future... talking about the past.

With all the talk about recent box office records being broken by the James Cameron hit Avatar, people have been keen to find out just where the movie actually stands in the history of the genre.

While the movie is poised to become the number one grossing movie of all time this week, beating out James Cameron's other massive hit Titanic (how cool must that be, to have that kind of credit?!) it lacks in something a bit more impressive... actual ticket sales!

Regardless of how much money the film makes, what any artist (director, actor, etc) really wants is his message/product to be experienced and understood by as many people as possible.

So, who exactly comes out on top of actual TICKET sales?

Well, The Hollywood Reporter's website THRFeed.com (which used to be a real magazine, you know... the kind made with paper but is now defunct - I believe) has compiled the actual list of the 20 films with the highest number of ticket sales. Avatar didn't make the list... however it impressively and comfortably sits at number 26.
The only thing these movies have over Avatar is time... I have no doubt it will climb a few notches up over the next few weeks, especially if they re-release the film like they did with Titanic.

So, here they are, I know you're dying to know!

Here's the Top 20 movies of all time ... by number of TICKETS sold:

1 "Gone With the Wind" (1939) 202,044,600
2 "Star Wars" (1977) 178,119,600
3 "The Sound of Music" (1965) 142,415,400
4 "E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial" (1982) 141,854,300
5 "The Ten Commandments" (1956) 131,000,000
6 "Titanic" (1997) 128,345,900
7 "Jaws" (1975) 128,078,800
8 "Doctor Zhivago" (1965) 124,135,500
9 "The Exorcist" (1973) 110,568,700
10 "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" (1937) 109,000,000
11 "101 Dalmatians" (1961) 99,917,300
12 "The Empire Strikes Back" (1980) 98,180,600
13 "Ben-Hur" (1959) 98,000,000
14 "Return of the Jedi" (1983) 94,059,400
15 "The Sting" (1973) 89,142,900
16 "Raiders of the Lost Ark" (1981) 88,141,900
17 "Jurassic Park" (1993) 86,205,800
18 "The Graduate" (1967) 85,571,400
19 "Star Wars: Episode I" (1999) 84,825,800
20 "Fantasia" (1941) 83,043,500

Where are all the old classic movie musicals? Hello Dolly? Guys and Dolls? Surprising.