He said: “Now, later, we have children, we have a family, we’ve got roots in Malibu and Santa Barbara, that conversation had to be amended slightly, but we did say after Avatar, let’s make this happen.”
Cameron, who has also directed blockbusters, including 1997’s Titanic, and 1986’s Aliens, said “New Zealand had eliminated the virus completely twice” before a “third time when it showed up in a mutated form, it broke through”.
He continued: “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.”
The Terminator director then asked: “Where would you rather live?
“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 polarised, turning its back on science and basically would be in utter disarray if another pandemic appears.”
During the chat, journalist Bensinger, 39, hailed the US as “a fantastic place to live”, to which Cameron interjected: “Is it?”
At another point in the discussion, Bensinger noted New Zealand’s stunning natural beauty, but Cameron added: “I’m not there for scenery, I’m there for the sanity.”