Well its here, James Cameron's Avatar has landed and I was one of many that was excited. Then I seen the trailer, and was immediately turned off. Then I seen the technological advancements necessary to make one frame of this movie possible and was 'semi-on board' for Cameron's two hour and 40 minute opus. So taking in my thoughts as well as the idiotic vacuum that is the internet, let us discuss what Avatar accomplished and what the movie failed miserably at executing. Here's two for starters: Effective emotive computer generated scenes requiring no dialog between characters, yes. One too many, Braveheart bad-ass speech-ery moments, also yes.
Avatar has a lot going against it. People [on the internet] claiming this movie to be a big-budget version of Fern-ahontas. Or was it Pocha-gully? Be that as it may, this is quite the notch for genre film making. This is film making that Robert Zemekis and Michael Bey should pay close attention to. Sure Avatar suffers from jilting pacing, and a lot of what occurs in the movie logically contradicts itself. [Apparently in the future there is only one guard that guards prisoners. These guards are susceptible to punches and kicks by a lovable and sober Michelle Rodriguez.]
Why should you see Avatar? I have a girlfriend who sculpts. I have a good friend who is an architect. Personally, I have no clue as to how they get from their original idea to an end-goal of a catrina or a brick and mortar building. Cameron, took his time [15 years give or take a couple weeks] sculpting and raising millions of dollars in the process -- simultaneously spear-heading a new technological advancement necessary prior to shooting a second of the movie. Avatar needs to be seen based on witnessing one person's idea that, on this level of film making -- has never been executed with such amazing success. Cameron's attempts to create another world, Pandora, where the viewer feels fully immersed works, for the most part.
Star Wars, Bladerunner and of course Aliens, are movies -- coincidentally science fiction -- that made me feel as I was a character inhabiting their respective worlds. This is something dependant on storytelling working cohesively with the set design of these kinds of movies. One could argue, that Cameron and his super-awesome special effects team, needed to figure out a 'new way' to transport the audience for artistic purposes. Personally, I watched this movie in a 3D IMAX theater. This was my first IMAX movie and the first 3D movie that didn't make me want to vomit on my neighboring loud-mouthed teenager.
Our faux parapalegic marine star, Sam Worthington, plays Jake Sully; a real mans man, but not really, who wanders [Final Fantasy-style] into this project with the hopes of doing a service for his country and hopefully getting a new spine [apropos?]. There is about an hour of, "Well, that looked cool" scenes in the midst of our mopey friend Jake being trained by one of many supermodel-esque Na'vi*. Jake does this via the highly experimental [and expensive] Avatar program [headed by Sigourney Weaver, who plays ... Sigourney Weaver], which allows him to 'jack-in' to these carbon copied, biologically built Na'vi look a-likes. The supermodel blue lady that trains Jake is Neytiri, played by Zoe Saldana. I was impressed by Neytiri, but a conundrum is presented. If you have an actor/actress whose CGI'd performance is powerful enough to be nominated for an award, do you nominate the actress? The special effects team? Or both?
Be that as it may, Cameron's new manner of capturing actors movements and expressions worked best when Neytiri was on screen. Unfortunately, not much can be said for Jake Sully's avatar which matched his face [much like Weaver's and Saldana's avatars] perfectly, but to a fault seeing as his face could not be more putty and unexpressive throughout much of the film. Sully is supposed to learn from the Na'vi, which helps both the scientists doing research about this alien culture, but in a 'surprise twist' that no one seen coming, his information also helps the military effort. This military effort to capture unobtanium [science speak for stuff that can't be gotten] is fronted by Giovanni Ribisi and Stephen Lang. You are probably wondering why I am not using their character names, its probably because its a moot point thanks to Cameron's character development.
Aside from a great deal of technical beauty, Avatar holds every trope of sci-fi mediocre character development. Worthington, Rodriguez, and soon to lead the Na'vi, Tsu'tey [played by Laz Alonso] are the only characters who are more than one-dimensional. This is unfortunate, because this is a style that Cameron has perfected in Aliens, Abyss and True Lies. You really don't need a multi-faceted movie if the movie is aimed at children. Oh wait, it isn't. With swear words and clever coverings of breasts and crotches, Avatar appears to be aimed at a young, slightly-hardcore sci-fi crowd. A crowd willing to deal with a bland earthling world that only further illuminates how 'cool looking' that the Na'vi alien world is. I could have watched The Matrix for that.
For every blade of grass and detailed creature,like those that spin like the little seeds with one-wing that fall to the ground after Spring, there is something that pulls you out of Cameron's beautifully conceived world. Not completely, it is something comparable to being a member of Dr. Augustine's [Ripley, I mean Weaver!] research team or even a tribe member of the Na'vi -- only to feel like a fly-on-the-wall when scenes that run on the long end as a means for Cameron to show you how awesome the world is he created. We get it, Avatar is 80 percent CG, how could we not? This element is not-so-cleverly patched up with the shoe-horned belief system that the Na'vi, or any of the tribes on Pandora, are all about peace and nature [Eywa is their Flying Speghetti Monster]. So occasionally you're going to get scenes that look like that "Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See" video, by Busta Rhymes.
It also seemed that there was someone shouting "ALLEGORY!" inches away from my ear whenever the cool, but incredibly one-dimensional Colonel Miles Quaritch [Lang] was on screen. So if Ribisi's character is the leader of Blackwater, what does that make this guy? To a fault of making Pandora such a cool place to experience, whenever Jake Sully was being all handicapped by his bland acting and wheelchair bound scenes the "Alice and Wonderland" effect is snatched away from the viewer. Much like Coraline, the best moments in Avatar are when you are not looking at humans act out this very generic storyline. The story progresses to a point where it feels, figuratively, like the Blue team vs the Red squad. And yes, that was a Strangers With Candy reference.
Cameron shows us a world that will tug on your inner-childs heartstrings. I believe I teared up when whats her face's whatchamacallit died, sorry I don't want to spoil that scene. That scene was actually really good. This world has nature and its inhabitants so intertwined that some form of organic internet has evolved amongst the Na'vi, creatures and plants ... its a shame Cameron didn't spend ten minutes on that. This eutopia is allegorical to many of our world's history.
Every scene feels like a painting. A painting I have seen before, but in HD and blue. Avatar is visually beautiful, has a cliche message, but a message tolerable given the wealth of craftsmanship. The presentation, the sound, inspire awe. However the movie is imbalanced. For a large majority of this movie to be CG, the human characters were the ones that felt the most plastic and uninteresting. I am glad to have watched it the way Cameron wanted me to, but I do not feel the urge to own the Blu-Ray. Nor do I feel like buying a stereoscopic 3D HD television in order to bring the 'experience home'. Cameron, you did it again. Genre movie-making gets a quality notch that will be felt through out all of Hollywood. But movies like Star Trek and District 9's effect will probably age better. See Avatar in the theater, it really is something.
*Why is it in science fiction movies like these, where we have aliens. The female, and in Avatar's case, even the males have to have some form of human-centric attractiveness? Why not an upside-down nose? or boobs on elbows?
I give Avatar...
The "A Thick Cup Of Yaddle Milk" Award