Hollywood director James Cameron has fled to New Zealand, describing the United States under a second Trump era as “insane” and predicting that when the next pandemic strikes, the country will descend into “disarray.”
The Titanic director spoke bluntly on a recent episode of “In Depth with Graham Bensinger” about relocating to the Land of the Long White Cloud where he both lives and spent years working on the Avatar movies.
Varietyreports Cameron first addressed his reason for heading south of the equator to take up citizenship in a country that has a population of 23 million sheep and just over five million people:
“After the pandemic hit… [New Zealand] had eliminated the virus completely. They actually eliminated the virus twice. The third time when it showed up in a mutated form, it broke through. But fortunately, they already had a 98% vaccination rate. This is why I love New Zealand.
“People there are, for the most part, sane as opposed to the United States where you had a 62% vaccination rate, and that’s going down – going the wrong direction.
“Are you kidding me? Where would you rather live?” Cameron continued as he praised New Zealand, its people, and their obedient nature as they followed orders when it came to dealing with COVID.
“A place that actually believes in science and is sane and where people can work together cohesively to a common goal, or a place where everybody’s at each other’s throats, extremely polarized, turning its back on science and basically would be in utter disarray if another pandemic appears.”
Former NZ Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ruled over an authoritarian state, declaring that people must only get their news from her government
New Zealand slid into outright authoritarianism during the coronavirus pandemic with some of the world’s strictest lockdowns and wound up with surges of Wuhan coronavirus infection and death anyway.
For example, the socialist government of then-Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern ordered a three-day snap lockdown in August 2021 over a single case of coronavirus transmission.
The Variety report notes when Graham Bensinger suggested the U.S. is still “a fantastic place to live,” Cameron questioned him by saying: “Is it?”
“But New Zealand is just stunningly beautiful,” Bensinger noted, to which Cameron replied: “I’m not there for scenery, I’m there for the sanity.”
James Cameron fronted a recent Tourism New Zealand commercial, encouraging Americans to visit the Land of the Long White Cloud
The Oscar-winning director added that he feels “safer” in New Zealand these days and not being in a country with President Donald Trump is to him a blessing, noting: “I certainly feel like I don’t have to read about [Trump] on the front page every single day. And it’s just sickening. There’s something nice about the New Zealand outlets — at least they’ll put it on page three.
“I just don’t want to see that guy’s face any more on the front page of the paper. It’s inescapable there, it’s like watching a car crash over and over and over.”
