By RYAN NAKASHIMA
AP Business Writer
LOS ANGELES – Blue-skinned aliens are helping Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. see green.
The runaway global success of James Cameron’s 3-D spectacle, “Avatar” – his first feature film since the record-breaking “Titanic” in 1997 – has prompted analysts to lift earnings estimates for News Corp., the owner of movie studio 20th Century Fox.
It’s fairly rare that a media conglomerate’s bottom line is affected by a single movie, but with more than $1.1 billion at box offices worldwide, partly boosted by higher 3-D ticket prices, “Avatar” has the potential to be the biggest of all time.