Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment affirms to have sold 1.5 million Blu-ray copies of the epic science fiction  film Avatar at the time of its first day in the stores Thursday. It is a new record for this format beating that of the 2008 superhero film The Dark Knight which had sold 600 000 copies in Blu-Ray at the time of its first day after the release.

The combined sales of the Blu-ray and DVD formats would have exceeded the four million copies according to the studio.

Note that the release was not on Tuesday as usual, but on Thursday to match with Earth Day. The movie is to be released in the United Kingdom on April 26th

The retailers would have sold 60% of their inventory in Blu-ray and approximately 50% of the one in DVD.

Let us recall that the film collected receipts of 2,7 billion $US to the world box office from its release last December. It is a historical record without precedent.

James Camron, the director for the motion picture, announced that the movie will be released a second time on the screens in August with six minutes of additional sequences. Moreover four discs, version in DVD and Blu-Ray is waited next November. So, we will not forget this movie in 2010.

The rumor had run already for a few weeks, it is now confirmed. Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment announced Wednesday that Avatar will be launched in DVD and Blu-Ray formats on Thursday, April 22nd in the United States and Canada, to coincide with the Earth Day.

You do not wait a ton of will extras. For the moment, the studio will offer only one simple finely functional in the two formats. One wants to use all the disk space to offer best audio quality and video according to the producer Jon Landau but it there also another reason…

A few days ago, one learned that the producers considered a new exit of Avatar on the screens with the autumn with additional sequences. However, it is after this return on the screens that the ultimate version in DVD and Blu-Ray Disc will be launched. This special edition should be ready next November, just in time for the time of the Festivals. In the case of the two exits, Avatar will be available only in 2D. One can suppose that with the nearest arrival of the television sets in 3D, a third special edition of Misadventure in 3D will be born in a nearest future.

Launched on the screens on December 18th, Avatar became the most lucrative film of all times with total receipts of 2.6 billion $US.

It will have now to be seen whether Avatar will also beat records in DVD. The first record to be beaten is that of The Dark Night which sold three million copies (including 600.000 Blu-Ray Disc copies) in only one day in December 2008.