When filmmaker Daniel Espinosa’s Swedish crime drama “Easy Money” opened in Sweden on Jan. 15, 2010, it had to go up against some major competition at the box office. A little record-breaking movie called “Avatar” had just debuted four weeks prior and won the box office for each of those weeks. There was no way a smaller movie like “Easy Money” was going knock the James Cameron- directed sci-fiadventure off its pedestal this early in the game.

During the fifth week, “Avatar” raked in $1.1 million. “Easy Money” topped it with $1.3 million.

“You only get to beat James Cameron once in a lifetime,” Espinosa, 34, told EXTRA during an interview to talk about his first American film “Safe House,” which stars Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds. “It was a great feeling.”

Along with beating “Avatar,” “Easy Money” hit peoples’ radars when it screened at the Berlin Film Festival. There, American studios quickly noticed Espinosa had the talent it would take to be a successful Hollywood director. Based on his work on “Easy Money,” he was given the opportunity to direct “Safe House,” a crime thriller that follows a fugitive (Washington) and a CIA agent (Reynolds) on the run when their safe house is attacked in South Africa.

During our interview, Espinosa, who is half Swedish and half Chilean, talked about how it feels as a director to seemingly unlimited amounts of money to make an American film and why he’s not looking to move from his home country of Sweden to Hollywood anytime soon.

“Safe House” opens at theaters February 10.

EXTRA: Other than the fact you beat James Cameron at the box office, why do you think you – a filmmaker unknown to U.S. audiences – were given the opportunity to direct a ...